Wagers
by siobhansgrant
Summary: All Dean Winchester wanted to do was find out what happened to his little brother. All Castiel wanted to do was find a way back to Heaven after his Fall. Who would have guessed things would end up like this? Supernatural/Constantine AU-crossover.
1. Leap of Lost Faith

**Author's Notes**: After about a week of being sick and watching Constantine, one of my favorite comic book movies (despite Keanu Reeves; I refuse to let anything ruin my Hellblazer fandom), approximately twenty-nine, it hit me that Castiel is essentially Constantine, and that Suernatural's Lucifer is so very much like Constantine's Lucifer. This is the result: a blending of the Constantine plot with Supernatural's plot. It took a little bit of time to figure out what characters belonged where, but I was quite pleased with the result.  
><strong>Warnings<strong>: Violence, suicide, profanity  
><strong>Spoilers<strong>: None, really.  
><strong>Disclaimer<strong>: My last name is neither Kripke, Gamble, or DC/Vertigo, so it's probably safe to assume I don't own them.

* * *

><p>"Sam didn't kill himself."<p>

Dean knows Sam, knows he wouldn't have done that.

Everything says otherwise, everything says that Sam threw himself off of that roof, but Dean knows Sam.

Dean knows Sam. Dean knows Sam had problems, knows Sam had his struggles, knows Sam in the way only Dean could. Dean essentially raised Sam, a father and a mother and a big brother and a friend, the only constant in Sam's life. Dean had given Sam everything he could, hot meals and a comfortable bed and clean clothes and patience and care and love.

Dean knows Sam like no one else does, and Dean knows Sam would never, ever do something like that.

But Jo doesn't comment immediately, just stares at the corpse for a few more minutes. "We have security footage, Dean," she says gently.

"Sam didn't kill himself. He wouldn't."

"He was sick, Dean. He wasn't right in the head."

Dean gives Jo a look so black it makes the detective start to sweat. "No. He wasn't that kind of sick. He wasn't crazy, not like that."

"Look, Dean, he thought he was seeing people's deaths. He wasn't…right. You've got to know that."

Dean knows exactly how not-right Sam was, and he knows that Sam would never commit suicide. Sam had problems, Dean knows, but he wasn't suicidal. The kid was more religious than anyone Dean had ever met—suicide was an unforgivable sin, and Sam would never have done such a thing.

"No. He would never kill himself. You knew him, Jo. He would never do that." It sounds exactly like denial to Jo, but he doesn't comment on it.

"I know he was sick, and that he's done things not too far from this before."

"No. Not Sam. He'd never do this to himself." Jo's known Dean long enough to know he's really saying _Sam would never do this to me_, _to us_.

"Detective Harvelle? Are you going to need another look at the security tapes before we go?" a timid cop asks, staring from Dean to Jo.

Jo switches her gaze to the young cop. "Yes. I'll be there in a second."

Dean lets Jo drag him to the security office, lets Jo flip the monitor back to the rooftop camera tapes, lets Jo shove him into a chair and force him to watch.

On the grainy black-and-white monitor, Dean watches his little brother scramble through the door to the rooftop. He watches Sam approach the edge of the roof, not hesitating until his toes almost hang off the edge.

Dean watches as Sam contemplates something, rubbing at his wrist before he yanks off his plastic hospital bracelet, letting it fly off in the wind. Sam turns his head to the camera, like he knew it was there all the time, shaggy hair blown every which way, mouths a word that Dean can't quite decipher, and then…

Then Sam leaps off the roof.

Jo pauses the tape, lets it sink in with Dean. For Jo, this case is closed. It was tragic, yes, but Sam was sick and had been so for quite a while, and it wasn't like Sam hadn't been violent towards others and himself before. All that remains to be done is to file the reports and catalogue the evidence.

For Dean, this case is still wide open.

Sam was sick—Dean knew he was. After all, it had always been Dean's job to take care of Sam, _his Sammy_, and Dean had been the one who'd decided Sam needed more help than he could reasonably provide on his own. He's going to want a copy of this security tape so he can see what Sam's mouthing to the camera, the hospital's files, interviews with everyone involved with Sam at the hospital…

Besides, now that Sammy's gone, it's not like Dean has anything else to do besides work.

* * *

><p>"Ruby's back," explained Sam, pointing to the drawing in the sketchbook. "She's going to teach me how to be even stronger. When you went to Hell, she helped me."<p>

Dean recognized the girl in the picture instantly—she has the room across the hallway. Her name really _was_ Ruby, Ruby Abel, but as far as Dean knew, she was just a bipolar single mother who tried to drown her two year old son. The girl who had the room before her was also named Ruby, Ruby Laurent, but she was a paranoid schizophrenic with a record of suicide attempts who was released after an almost three year stint here.

Sam was a good artist when it came to drawing his visions and delusions, Dean noted, but was barely capable of stick figures when it came to anything else. This particular sketch featured 'Ruby' in a black leather jacket and jeans, her eyes the solid black that Sam insisted signified demonic possession.

Gently, Dean took the sketchbook and closed it, not wanting to see any more of the strange things Sam had come up with.

"Wait, wait, I have to show you Castiel!" Sam said excitedly, snatching back the black-bound book.

The drawing was unlike anything Dean had seen of Sam's so far.

The man in the sketch was serious, stony-faced, arms held stiffly at his side as if he didn't quite know what to do with them. He wore a rumpled trench coat over a suit, the coat hanging off of his shoulders loosely. His dark hair looked just as rumpled as his clothing, like he'd just rolled out of bed wearing yesterday's clothing and decided that trying was just too much effort. The only detail Sam had colored in were the man's eyes—a vivid shade of blue that contrasted dramatically.

Dean didn't recognize the man, despite how he had a nagging feeling in his gut that he knew him. No new patients had arrived in the lockdown ward Sam had gotten confined to, either, and Sam hadn't been allowed to leave his room since he'd assaulted some poor random patient, saying the guy was being possessed by the demon Azazel. This _Castiel_ seemed to be a first for Sam, coming up with a completely made-up character.

"His name is Castiel, and he's the angel who brought you back from Hell. He's trying to help us beat Meg and stop the Apocalypse too. You haven't met yet, not officially face-to-face, but I think you're going to be friends with him."

Smiling politely, Dean nodded. He knew it was best just to go with Sam about these things, especially now that since starting art therapy and beginning to keep a sketchbook he hadn't been violent or even too difficult. His doctor Dean wasn't about to ruin a good thing.

Sam closed his sketchbook as he rose to his feet, stretching. "You gonna come back after dinner?" He tossed his sketchbook onto his bedside table, looking to Dean expectantly.

That almost broke Dean, that look of innocent trust, how much Sam trusted him with. It took him a moment to realize he was supposed to answer the question.

"Oh. Uh, yeah. Yeah. I'll get you something to eat. McDonald's sound good to you?"

Sam shook his head violently, attitude suddenly changed. Dean recognized it as him slipping into one of his episodes. "No. You have to go find Castiel before we can do anything. He's going to help us. We have to find him before it's too late. I've seen him for a long time but now we've got to find him."

"Okay, sure. Where is he?" Dean hadn't wanted to upset Sam, particularly not since this was the first episode all week.

"You have to find him."

"I will. But where is he?"

Sam shook his head again as he grabbed his sketchbook again, flipping frantically through the pages, until he found the picture of Dr. Singer, his primary psychiatrist, he'd drawn ages ago. "Bobby. Bobby will help you. Bobby."

Dean stared at the picture of Dr. Singer. The older man wore a plaid shirt and worn jeans with a trucker cap for one "Singer Salvage". It was oddly fitting for him, despite that Dean had never seen the psychiatrist in anything but suits and lab coats.

Nodding, Dean made a note to discuss this new twist in Sam's delusions with Dr. Singer tomorrow. He was going to talk to 'Bobby', certainly, but not to find this likely nonexistent Castiel.

"I'll be back at eight, okay? Hold yourself together until then, bitch."

Sam didn't say anything, just bit his lower lip and stared at his sketchbook. He didn't even bother to respond with his customary "I will, jerk."

Dean didn't push it. He just turned around and left, never once thinking twice.

Much later, as Dean sits in his apartment, watching his little brother throw himself off of the roof again and again on the security tape, Dean wishes he'd left Sam with an 'I love you', with a 'You're my brother, and I'll take care of you no matter what', with some form of good-bye.

But, no.

His last words to Sam, maybe the last thing Sam had listened to, were "Hold yourself together, bitch."

And it makes Dean hate himself that little bit more.

* * *

><p>Dean is aware he's having a nightmare, but he can't stop it.<p>

He's had this nightmare hundreds of times before, but now it has a new aspect of horror: this is exactly what happened to his brother.

Dean scurries out of the narrow staircase that leads to the roof, letting the door slam behind him.

He is all calm determination until he reaches the edge of the roof, toeing the man-made cliff. Below him is the glass roof over the patient physical therapy aquatics center.

He doesn't really have a choice—either he will throw himself over the roof or whatever's driving him to do this will force him to.

He turns to the security camera he knows is there, he knows his brother will see.

"_Dean_," something murmurs to him internally. "_Dean_."

"_Castiel_," he whispers back. He doesn't quite know why the name soothes him, but it does.

He scratches at the spot on his wrist where a symbol he'd never paid much attention to before lies before roughly yanking off the plastic hospital bracelet. It flutters off in the wind, and Dean watches it for a second.

And then, he spreads his arms and takes the step.

As usual, Dean wakes up before he should hit the glass above the pool, a chill settling into his bones despite how he's soaked in sweat.

Dean throws back the sheets and starts up his laptop, swearing at the slowness of the technology as he waits. It's not like he's going back to sleep, not after that…nightmare. After all, that's all it is, right? A nightmare?

Still, he sits there and curses under his breath. He re-starts the security footage of Sam, waiting for the moment.

"Castiel." That's what Sam is mouthing to the camera.

_Castiel_.

Castiel, the man or angel or God knows what that Dean is supposed to find.

_Castiel. Castiel. Castiel._

Then Dean's only thought is that this Castiel will help him.

He flicks through the pages of Sam's sketchbook, past the portraits of patients and doctors and nurses and orderlies mutilated into the characters of his delusions, past the demons and witches and hunters, until he finds the very last drawing in the sketchbook.

_Castiel_.

Blue eyes, dark messy hair, head cocked slightly to the side like a curious bird, trench coat and suit.

Dean plugs the name into the police database, thankful that he can at least do this much without having to get to the station.

It pulls up only one result.

_Castiel Novak_.

Dean only has to glance at the physical description to know that this is the Castiel he's supposed to find.


	2. The Exorcism

Sometimes, Castiel kind of fucking hates his job.

Like today.

"I have a new mission for you." Zachariah is a royal dick, and talks down to Castiel endlessly, but nothing paranormal happens without Zachariah knowing something about it.

"What is it?" Castiel's only been home for barely a day after his last mission for Zachariah and he doesn't exactly have the abilities he used to. He needs sleep. And food. And maybe another cigarette. And probably some more alcohol.

"You know, Castiel, I'm starting to think that you're getting ready to retire, looking at how little you've done in these past few months." Castiel can practically _hear_ Zachariah smirking through the phone.

"Go fuck yourself."

It's not the most original thing he's ever said, but it's exactly how he's feeling right now.

The faint ghost of his original powers he's managed to cling to all this time is finally starting to fade, and he can feel exhaustion settling in his bones, migraines forming in his temples. He isn't who he used to be, and Zachariah knows it.

"Twelve year old. Asian. Parents don't speak English. Latin did nothing. Be here in six minutes."

Castiel doesn't reply, just hangs up and grabs his coat. _Fuck mortality. Who needs sleep and food when there's coffee and cigarettes_

* * *

><p>"My name is Castiel. Castiel Novak, asshole. I'm going to send you back to Hell." He likes making an appearance. His name carries a weight to it that anybody or anything who's ever been involved with the paranormal could recognize.<p>

The girl's eyes flit to solid black as she smiles sweetly. "It's been a while since we last met, Castiel. I see you've changed. Shiny new last name and all."

_Meg._

"Are you going to go peacefully, or are you going to make me force you?" In truth, Castiel isn't quite sure he could force any demon back to Hell unaided right now, not with how his powers are waning, particularly not something like Meg.

Meg primly uncrosses her hands, the sigil for binding a demon to a body carved into her palms. "I don't think you can. I think you're Falling, Castiel, faster than before. I think you're scared and almost powerless. I think you couldn't send me back if you wanted to."

That pisses Castiel off more than it should.

Maybe because for once, he knows that a demon isn't lying.

"Watch me." Castiel's pride won't let him just perform the standard vanilla exorcism and leave, not after Meg _told_ him he didn't have the ability left in him to exorcise her the way he used to.

"No, Castiel."

He ignores her.

The fight is brief. Castiel is winded and exhausted, but despite Meg's demonic abilities, reality remains that Castiel is a full-grown adult man and Meg is in the body of a twelve year old.

Meg laughs as Castiel pins her to the floor, one hand on her throat.

"What's funny, hell-bitch?"

"Everything, Castiel. You see, Lilith is free. She's free and she's going to set old Lucifer free and they're gonna get you…"

Castiel presses his palm to her forehead before she has a chance to finish her sentence, and suddenly, sulfur-scented black smoke is choking out of the girl, vanishing into the floor. It's over. Meg is gone.

It takes all of Castiel's strength not to collapse on the floor. His little show has left him hollow inside, the dwindling remains of what he used to be almost completely gone now. It will be days before he's got enough juice to do something like this again.

_Fuck_. There was a time when he'd taken down an entire legion of hellspawn on his own, and now something as easy as sending Meg back to Hell practically fucking _crippled_ him.

Zachariah stands in the exit to the apartment, holding the wad of cash the girl's parents had given him.

Castiel snatches the entire bundle of money as he leaves.

"Hey, I need a cut!"

"I'm out of commission until next week because of you." Castiel shoves the money into his pocket even as he rummages for a cigarette with shaking hands. "I need it more."

He has to lean against the wall as he waits for the ever-faithful Becky to show up with his ride back home, trying to seem casual. His fingers tremble as he lights his cigarette—even his body is starting to fail him.

Castiel wonders if this is how normal people feel about getting old. He used to be all-powerful, all-knowing. His original form could have burned out the eyes of unworthy mortals and his real voice could have shattered glass.

And now?

Castiel has almost nothing. Just memories that fade every day, powers that grow weaker by the hour, so much knowledge crammed into a human brain that it actually gives him headaches, a failing mortal body, and a chain-smoking habit.

Yeah. Sometimes Castiel _really fucking hates_ his job.

* * *

><p>Castiel wakes up coughing, barely managing to stumble to the bathroom before it got too bad.<p>

He spits blood and phlegm into the porcelain sink even as he continues to cough. The contrast of the red blood against the white is drastic.

It takes a good five minutes for the coughing to finally stop, and by that time Castiel is even more exhausted than he was before he tried to catch some sleep. This weariness is a more recent addition to the tiredness of his body, a bone-deep ache and longing for what he used to be.

He knows there's a bottle of painkillers on his nightstand, from all that time ago when he'd fractured all the bones in his right foot. It would be so easy to pop a few and let the high slip him into rest…

But, of course, Castiel won't do that. He needs to keep his record as clean as possible.

Instead, he gulps down some cough suppressant directly from the bottle and flops down onto his bed. He's going to need to see a doctor tomorrow—he doesn't need his powers to know there's something wrong in this mortal body.

He hates everything, Castiel decides. He hates everything. Mortality, Heaven, Hell, demons, angels, humans, his job, his "colleagues", his human body, magic, grace. All of it. Everything. Anything.

Castiel debates giving up, but he knows what's going to happen if he does.

So he rises from the bed and flicks on the overhead light.

There's always work to be done.

* * *

><p>"How can I help you?" Dr. Singer shoves a cup of coffee into Dean's hands.<p>

To be honest, Dean likes Dr. Singer, and not just because Dr. Singer was the first psychiatrist to ever get any major breakthrough from Sam. He's gruff and to the point, but he's not unfriendly. Sam had looked to the psychiatrist like he was the father Sam had never had.

"Did Sam ever talk to you about a man named Castiel?"

Dr. Singer shakes his head as he sips his own chipped mug of coffee. "Patient confidentiality. Unless this is about Sam's suicide on police business, I can't tell you anything."

"My badge is in my pocket, but if it would make you feel better…"

"Just checkin'."

"I think that this Castiel man might have something to do with his…suicide. 'Castiel' was the last thing he said before he jumped."

"After you woke up from your coma last month, boy ran into my office and insisted that an angel had pulled ya outta Hell. Said he was named Castiel. Had one of his pictures with him too, man in a trench coat smoking a cigarette.

"Confused the hell of me, too. Sam used to be consistent, ya know? The people he created in his delusions were all based on real people he met, but not Castiel. I kept it. I think you're gonna wanna see it." Dr. Singer shifts through a pile of papers on his desk until he finds the right one, handing it to Dean.

It's possible the weirdest drawing Sam had ever done—at least, out of the ones Dean had seen.

The man Dean now recognizes as Castiel straddles Dean's chest as Dean lies in a hospital bed, affixed to a multitude of machinery. Castiel has one palm pressed to Dean's forearm and the other submerged in what looks like a bedpan of water, the sleeves of his dress shirt and trench coat rolled up to his elbows, pentagrams edged in rays tattooed on his forearms. It's clear that Castiel is doing something to him in the picture, but as to what it might be, Dean can't even begin to figure out.

It's fully colored in, unusual for Sam. Painstaking attention had been paid to every little detail, from the tattoos on Castiel's forearms to the readouts on the monitor. It's like someone ripped the scene from a memory. Dean can almost _see_ Sam hunched over the paper, assortment of colored pencils scattered across the surface of his desk, eyebrows knitted together in concentration.

"What the hell?" It's the best Dean can come up with, staring at the picture.

"I got no idea. Sam said it was Castiel pulling you out of Hell. Said Castiel was an angel that'd been ordered to pull you out." Bobby shrugs.

"You think… You think… Sam might've been talking about a real guy?"

Bobby laughs roughly, staring at the blue laminate floor. "Everyone thought you were brain-dead, boy. You were attacked by a serial killer, shot in the back, and hit by a truck. No one comes out of something like that okay.

"Sam was all kinds of torn up. It was bad, Dean. He attacked two orderlies and five other patients. We almost debated sending him to a more equipped facility. But one day, he just…stopped. Did a complete three-sixty in attitude. It was the day he gave me that, talking about angels and this Castiel.

"I attributed it to nothing but another one of his mood shifts, but… You woke up the next day. Perfectly healthy, walking and talking. That doesn't happen. You should be dead." Bobby shakes his head, still looking at the floor.

And that, Dean realizes later, is the moment he knew that Castiel wasn't just Sam's creation.

Castiel was real.

And Castiel knew what had happened to his brother.


	3. Little Talks

Dr. Amelia Novak has been Castiel's doctor from the moment he woke up trapped in this mortal body years ago.

He'd come to her when she was still just a resident in the Emergency Department, stumbling in naked, the shadow of what looked like massive tattered and torn wings on the wall behind him, all the electronic equipment flickering with his entrance, a storm suddenly raging outside.

"My name is Castiel, and I am an—" he'd started, but he'd collapsed, unconscious, before he got a chance to finish his sentence.

People were screaming, praying, shouting, whispering, crying, staring.

Amelia was the only one to keep her head, rushing over, taking his vitals, shouting for supplies and a gurney. Of course, she'd been panicking too, but there was something in Castiel that reminded her far too much of her deceased husband to let him just slip away.

Castiel had been perfectly healthy—there'd been nothing in his system, literally _nothing_. No food, no drugs, no alcohol, not even hormones. His body was as pure as a newborn's: skin blemish-free, blood clean, pulse constant, lungs strong, brain fully functional.

The only things out of the ordinary were the carvings all along his bones and the way he kept insisting he was, in fact, an angel of the Lord.

The carvings had mystified everyone. They looked like some lost language—later, Amelia would learn it was Enochian—and they covered every inch of Castiel's bones, from the tiniest bones of his feet to his skull. There was no natural way for that to happen.

"Michael did it to me," Castiel had explained, eyes glossed over as he stared at nothing in particular. He'd been heavily sedated, and it'd been showing. "Because I Fell. Because I loved humanity more than I loved my Father. Well, that's what Michael said. But I love my Father. I love Him and I love my brothers."

He'd begun crying, babbling about his family and how he'd made a choice. Amelia hadn't understood much of it, but she understood enough. Castiel's family had kicked him out after he made a wrong choice. That was simple enough. If he claimed they were all angels, well, Amelia knew that people had said crazier things.

She knew Castiel better than any other human alive, and she knew damned well when Castiel was pretending. He hadn't been fine in quite a while, but she hadn't dared to ask him.

Looking at the x-ray of Castiel's lungs, she realizes she should have asked him sooner.

It's cancer. Lung cancer, stage four, metastasized to overtake almost eighty-five percent of his lungs. It's too late, Amelia realizes with a sinking feeling in her stomach.

It's too late for treatment, not that Castiel would have accepted any chemotherapy or surgery.

It's too late for Castiel, just like it was too late for Jimmy, these stupid stubborn men with their pretty blue eyes and pack-a-day habits. Amelia wishes she could save Castiel more than anything in the world, save him like she couldn't save her own husband from this stupid fucking disease.

If she couldn't save Jimmy, she could save Castiel, she had once reasoned. He was a good enough replacement, despite being almost totally unlike her soft-spoken, dedicated-family-man husband. If Amelia squinted slightly she could see Jimmy instead of this bitter, hard-bitten man. She never wanted to date Castiel—oh, God, _no_—but she wanted to save him.

But this time?

This time, she can't save Castiel.

No one recovers from this type of cancer, not when it's so advanced.

"You can do something." Castiel sounds so confident in it that for a moment, Amelia almost believes it herself.

"Not when it's this advanced. I'd give you about five to six months."

"There's got to be something, right?" Castiel pulls out another cigarette and his lighter, the motions practiced and easy.

"Oh, that's a good idea." But Amelia can see the panic starting to edge in on Castiel.

"Look, I can't go. Not yet. I've got jobs to finish, things to do."

"You need to prepare. Start making arrangements. Novak…"

That gets Castiel's attention, the last name Amelia had given him when she'd helped him forge his birth certificate. It was her last name, as it had been her husband's, but it was just another thing of Jimmy's she'd given him, from his clothes to his shoes. Besides, Jimmy and Castiel could have been brothers in real life, only subtle differences between their physical appearances. No one was the wiser.

"Yeah?" Castiel freezes from where'd been about to leave.

"I… I'm here for you, okay? If you need anything… I'm here. I can help you with arranging things." And it's not just because Castiel is her replacement for Jimmy, but because Amelia is honestly fond of Castiel. He's good with her little Claire, despite what he claims about not being good with kids, and he's been great at helping Claire overcome the difficulties of autism. He's trying to help people. And he deserves better than he's getting.

Castiel laughs bitterly. "Don't bother. I already know exactly where I'm going." And then he leaves.

He leaves Amelia sitting there, staring at the x-ray, and then Amelia knows Castiel needs more than his lungs mended.

* * *

><p>"Hold the door if you're going down!" Dean jogs towards the elevator, head spinning, gut clenching. His appointment with Father Rufus was in thirty minutes, and he had a briefing to give on the "real" case he was supposed to be working on…<p>

But the scrap of paper he'd written this Castiel's address on was practically burning a hole in his pocket. Dean wanted to find him, and fast, but it was going to have to wait until later.

A man in a trench coat smirks at him as he presses the Door Close button. "Not if I can help it."

As the doors close, Dean can't decide if how eerily the man had looked like Castiel was just a coincidence or if… But no. Why would Castiel be here? In a hospital?

So Dean turns back, heads for the stairs, and ignores the way that little voice in the back of his head whispers that Castiel had been so close…

* * *

><p>Castiel grins as Bela unpacks the bag of supplies.<p>

He might not like her as a person, but Bela knows what she's doing and what she's dealing. They've worked together before, several times, and Castiel has to admit that Bela's pretty fucking great at what she does. They make a great team, practically unstoppable —a master thief and a Fallen angel-turned-exorcist-come-sorcerer—even if they can barely stand each other.

Five items line up neatly in a row across Castiel's kitchen table. Bela points to each object as she explains.

Two water-filled glass balls with a cross engraved in the sides? "Holy water from the river Jordan."

What looks like a golden flamethrower? "Dragon's Breath."

"Thought no one could get that anymore." Castiel is fairly impressed, actually.

Bela looks pleased with herself. "Most people can't. I, however, am a great thief and a trader of fine occult procurements."

A match box taped shut? "Screech beetle from Amityville. Watch this." Bela has one of her signature smirks on, letting Castiel know that whatever comes next is going to probably cause him bodily pain in some way or another.

The shrieking noise that the beetle makes as Bela shakes the match box overwhelms Castiel. He falls to his knees, fingers in his ears as he tries to block out the shrieking. He feels like the noise is reaching into his skull and tearing into his mind.

"Hm. Seems like there's still a little angel in you somewhere. The beetle's noise is like nails on a chalkboard to the Fallen." Bela shrugs, sets down the match box and taps the last object, a cloth-wrapped elongated shape.

"This was very, very difficult to get, even for me. I fully expect a bonus in my paycheck for the effort I through to get this."

Bela slides back the cloth, revealing the plain silver sword. It's no longer than her forearm, and completely unadorned. It's one solid piece, as if cast all at once. It's all clean lines and simple grace. It's fitting.

Castiel recognizes it instantly. "That's… That's my angel blade. How'd you… Bela, this was taken from me by an archangel. It should have been locked in limbo."

"I told you, Castiel. I am a great thief." Bela smiles primly.

Castiel snatches it up before she has a chance to pick it up. The blade feels _right_ in his hands. His skin buzzes with the powers contained in his sword, and the dull-burning remnants of Grace Castiel has left in him flicker up, sensing the familiar presence.

It's not quite as powerful in his grip as it was when Castiel was something more than this sad mockery of an angel, but it's close enough.

It is _his_, undeniably, his sword and no one else's. And that is something that none of Castiel's brothers can ever take away from him.

Castiel can feel that it's been used by someone else, the taint of their presence clinging to the silver. Names come into his mind, unbidden—among them, Bela Talbot—and he knows that they are the ones who tried to use this extension of his Grace and powers. He knows it worked to some extent, since it really was nothing more than a magic blade, but he also knows it didn't easily wield to them.

The blade is Castiel's, just as it has always been.

"Thank you." He can only imagine the lengths Bela had to go to get it.

"Don't thank me. Just an extra zero to my check."

Castiel opens his mouth to say something, but all that comes out was a cough. Fortunately, though, it's not a terribly long coughing spell, but it does leave Castiel winded, practically panting.

"On the house." Bela puts down a bottle of prescription-strength cough suppressant. "I'll just charge it to your account, then?"

Castiel nods, breaking the plastic seal on the cough suppressant with trembling fingers. He gulps it down directly from the bottle, not bothering to read the recommended amount.

"You know anything about the demon Lilith?" He screws the lid back onto the bottle slowly.

Bela pales. "Why do you need to know?"

"Pulled a demon out of a girl that said Lilith was walking free, whatever that means. Wondered if the queen of information brokers knew anything."

"Castiel, she's bad business. Very, very bad business."

"What type of bad business?" Castiel can tell that Bela's scared, something that unnerves him immensely. Bela is _never_ scared. End of story. The snarky bitch had offered deals to fucking _crossroads demons_ before.

Bela swallows, hand curling reflexively around the demon-killing knife Castiel knows she always carries in the pocket of her jacket. "She was the first demon, Castiel. Lucifer corrupted her himself. You can't even begin to comprehend the amount of power it would take to make Lilith do anything she didn't want to, let alone exorcise her…"

Castiel quirks an eyebrow.

"Well, maybe _you_ can, but… No human could send her back if she didn't want to be sent. It would take a full angel to deport her unwillingly." Bela clutches her knife tighter. "She's the top of the hierarchy. Actually, she _invented_ the hierarchy. She has an entire legion alone serving as her bodyguards, not including her Hellhounds and personal staff. Rumor has it she had the King of the Crossroads as her personal whore, too. If she's topside…"

"Demons lie."

Castiel's at the buffet line, and his plate? Overflowing. He doesn't have time for this shit.


	4. The Devil You Know

The Crossroads is an exclusive club run by the King of the Crossroads, a sexually ambiguous Scottish demon by the name of Crowley.

Of course, in LA, "exclusive" clubs are a dime a dozen, but The Crossroads is "exclusive" in the true meaning of the word. Crowley likes to run his business the old-fashioned way.

There is no velvet rope, no outside line. There's just two bouncers with a deck of picture cards. Get what's on the back of the card right, and you get in. Get it wrong, and go home. There is no third option; the bouncers are all demons and, after all, this is the house of the King of the Crossroads. Crowley is essentially all-powerful within the walls of The Crossroads.

Castiel hates The Crossroads. He doesn't like the patrons—they're everything from demons to witches to vampires to vanilla humans—and he doesn't like clubs of any sort—too loud and too many drugs and too much alcohol and too much chaos.

He doesn't even like Crowley, really, but Crowley is the most powerful permanent resident in the area. Crowley didn't rise to be the King of the Crossroads just because.

The demon has all types of connections and a collection of occult wares like no one else in the world. Crowley just has to snap his fingers and he has sixteen legions of demons and about twenty-five packs of Hellhounds at his service.

Castiel's learned that Crowley's connections just aren't paranormal, either—he owns half of Congress, two previous Presidents, about three-fourths of all the celebrities popular at the moment, a current Presidential candidate, the entire LA court system, and all the latest war-torn countries.

Crowley makes a powerful ally and an even more powerful enemy. The dick knows his business.

Castiel would almost be impressed, but he's battled Crowley before, when he still had his full angelic abilities, and he saw into Crowley's mind. Castiel was unimpressed.

But the fact remains, Crowley is a great fucking businessman and he has what Castiel needs.

So Castiel gives Becky the directions to The Crossroads and quietly listens to the overeager girl babble on about her latest piece of fan-fiction. She's a nice girl, really, just a little obsessed with those stupid _Supernatural_ novels. Admittedly, she was dating the author, Chuck, though Becky had been a fan from long before they started dating.

But all that really matters to Castiel is that Becky has a nice car and she's willing to drive him pretty much anywhere, so long as he doesn't smoke in her car and makes some semblance of conversation. As she said, he saved her from being tortured to death by demons. Playing chauffeur was the least she could do.

"So then he rubbed his chest…"

"Becky, aren't these guys brothers?" Castiel normally has a high tolerance for her ramblings, but listening to her recite homoerotic fan-fiction is toeing that fine line.

Becky rolls her eyes. "It's not wrong if they love each other."

Castiel rolls his eyes right back, a habit picked up from Becky herself. "It's…unsettling, love or not. And you just missed the turnoff because you were too busy describing the way they fuck each other."

Becky is stonily silent until they pull up in front of The Crossroads.

Castiel hands Becky his handgun, slipping his blade into the holster tucked inside his coat instead. "Bullets made from blessed silver and bronze, filled with rock salt and dead man's blood. They should kill anything. Just in case."

"In case of _what_?"

"I have business to do. If I don't come out, I want you to go to my apartment and stay there. Call Bela. Understand?" Castiel is relatively sure he's not going to have to fight, since Crowley prides himself on keeping The Crossroads a neutral point despite being a demon himself, but Castiel is still walking into a bar filled with people he'd be fighting with in any other situation.

Castiel heads towards the club, Becky chasing after him. "Castiel! Castiel! Wait!"

"Two frogs on a bench." He opts to ignore Becky in favor of turning to the bouncer.

The bouncer nods as he lifts the rope to let Castiel in.

"Two frogs on a bench." Becky likes Castiel, really, she does, but sometimes she can't stand the way he avoids closure of any sort.

The bouncer shakes his head.

"Look, I'm with him! Castiel! Castiel Novak!"

Castiel either can't hear her or is ignoring her, because he keeps on walking.

The bouncer puts a hand on Becky's shoulder, telling her without words to back off. She sighs and heads back towards her car.

* * *

><p>Inside of The Crossroads, it's a blending of time periods. Crowley's been running the club nonstop since the nineteenth century and it like he never really decided to completely refurbish it.<p>

Victorian wallpaper, Seventies mirror panels and Prohibition-era furniture make it feel hodgepodge underneath the smog and red strobe lighting. A DJ is playing some hip new dance song while the clientele, dressed in everything from business suits to BDSM gear, enjoy themselves, dancing and drinking and doing things that under any other circumstance Castiel would be compelled to deport them for.

But Castiel isn't here for a fight.

He opts to just make his way to the back of the club, towards Crowley's office. He does freeze for a moment in front of a table where a group of nephilim sit, turning water into wine for the amusement of a gaggle of pretty college-age human girls.

Castiel's first instinct is to tell them that they are disgracing their divine Father, but just as he opens his mouth, he realizes he's no longer the Castiel they might have listened to. He's Fallen now, a mortal, nothing terribly threatening to a nephilim.

So Castiel just keeps on walking, only pausing momentarily beside a group of daevas literally eating a pig alive. The pig is squealing inside of the body bag they've trapped it in. But again Castiel keeps walking. This is neutral territory.

Castiel stares at the hidden door on the back wall, waiting. He knows Crowley will know he's here; the demon has wards all over the place triggered to go off if anything suspicious enters the club. Castiel still sets off angel wards, despite his Fall, and he's fully aware that since they first met Crowley made a point of learning how to defend himself from angels.

A man with half of his face over taken with scar tissue opens the door, stepping out. Castiel steps in, letting the door close behind him.

Crowley sits behind his massive desk, yelling something into one of the six phones on his desk.

"Look, if you can't get the bloody deal sealed, I'll send the Hellhounds after _you_! Either get the yes or I will personally torture him into it!" snaps Crowley, slamming the receiver down. He takes a deep breath before taking another swig of the scotch on the desk.

Castiel pulls one of the oak chairs around the room in front of the desk, taking a seat gracefully. "Don't get up. Wouldn't want you inconveniencing yourself for me or anything."

Crowley gives Castiel a look so violent that it starts to unnerve him. "You've been absent for quite a while. You bring me anything?"

"No. I've been too busy lately."

"Maybe selling forgeries has been bad for your health." The way Crowley says it, it's part threat, part passive-aggressive bullshit.

"I didn't know. I thought it was authentic!" Castiel likes giving Crowley trouble, but he does in fact value his life and reputation.

Crowley sipped at his scotch. "I've heard your health is bad for other reasons. How long?"

"Few months." Castiel sees no reason to lie to Crowley—it's not like the demon couldn't pick up one of those phones and have his entire medical history instantly. Crowley keeps tabs over all his employees, even if they're just occasionally allies like Castiel.

"You know, you're the one bloody soul Lucifer himself would come up to collect if he could." Crowley flicks his fingers, the bottle of scotch pouring itself into his glass.

"So I've heard." It comes out dryer than Castiel intended, and Crowley raises an eyebrow.

"Well, I'm sure you didn't come here to make an extension on your deadline, so why are you here?"

"Do you know anything about a demon named Lilith?" Castiel's not very good about the whole small-talk thing.

Crowley, the King of the Crossroads, who sold his soul because he saw business potential in becoming a demon (though his official deal says it was for three extra inches under the belt, Castiel knows the real reason), who owns enough political power to start World War Three, who has enough paranormal power to make all but angels tremble in fear, _fucking blanches_ at the name Lilith.

"Did you try to fight her?" Crowley's practically whispering.

"Heard from Meg that she's out of Hell. Just was curious."

"Demons like Lilith stay in Hell. Demons lie, you know." But Crowley seems a little on edge now. Castiel's hit a nerve here.

"I just want to use the Chair."

Crowley tenses, setting his glass down. "You know I'm neutral, Castiel."

"You know, before you became such a bureaucrat, you were the best Hell had. It was you against the best twenty angels we had, and I—" started Castiel.

"You _were_ Castiel. _The_ Castiel, an angel of the Lord. Once."

Castiel slams his fist into Crowley's antique desk. "I can _feel_ it, Crowley. Something's going on."

"I don't want to hear it." Crowley points to the door, but before Castiel gets halfway there, Anna walks in, smiling politely.

"Sounds spooky." Anna twists the ring around her finger mindlessly, expression both mercilessly condescending and absentmindedly pleased.

"Anna." Castiel has never like Anna—not even before, when he was a full-fledged angel, and certainly not now.

Anna grins. "Hello, Castiel. I heard that you've begun suffering for the sins of your Fall. Apparently not even you can avoid the righteous wrath of God."

"I'll show you righteousness! I'll send you running back to—" Castiel starts, reaching for the angel blade concealed in his jacket.

Crowley's fist slams into his desk, knocking over the bottle of scotch and the various relics collected on the top of his desk. "You both know the rules of my house. Obey them or I will have both of you banished, forever."

Castiel stops from drawing his blade, but he doesn't relax, not as Anna keeps smiling serenely.

"I've heard that you're headed down, Castiel."

"Go fuck yourself." Castiel can feel a deep cough roiling from his chest, but still turns for the door. He won't let Anna see him hacking up a cancer-riddle lung—he won't let the bitch have that satisfaction.

Castiel keeps walking even as he coughs, grabbing a clean napkin from one of the tables to press against his mouth, trying to catch the bloody phlegm working its way up from his lungs. He stumbles outside, thankful for Becky, who's there instantly with a supporting arm around his waist and a gentle soothing voice to whisper comforts.

Castiel lets himself be held, doesn't even bother to try to act like he's fine.

Castiel is exhausted.

* * *

><p>Dean stares at the bottle of pills. He hasn't touched them in months, hasn't had a need to.<p>

But tonight, he can feel the creep of paranoia sinking into his mind, images of yellow-eyed men and his mother burning alive on the ceiling floating among his thoughts.

Dean swallows the two small white pills down with a gulp of Coke. He knows it'll be easier to talk to this Castiel if he can make sure none of it is his own invention, even though Dean hates his medication.

It's just an anti-psychotic, Dean reasons with himself. No different from what he'd been forcing down Sam's throat for the past ten or so years. And it was prescribed to him for just these types of situations, after all.

So Dean puts on his best cocky smile and grabs his badge and Sam's sketchbook from the desk as he heads out of his apartment, opting for his usual layer of bullshit and arrogance to cover up the way his stomach is turning flips.

He's almost used to it by now.


	5. To Hell and Back

Castiel takes a long drag of his cigarette, a glass of whiskey in front of him. He ought to be looking up more about Lilith, but right now, he just can't bring himself to give a shit.

He's going to die. He's accepted that fact.

What he can't accept is the way his body is failing on him. He used to be something awe-inspiring, a massive being of metaphysical light and energy, divine and supernatural, holy and powerful. He used to have hundreds of brothers, a loving Father…

And now? Now he has fucking lung cancer, and it's going to kill him.

A spider creeps along the table top, and Castiel chugs his whiskey before turning the glass over it, a glass prison. He lifts the cup up for a brief moment, enough to exhale the smoke in his lungs into it.

Castiel watches as the spider twitches feebly a few times before going still.

"Welcome to my life."

Before, Castiel had nothing but the highest respect and regard for his Father's creatures.

But now? Now Castiel just can't bring himself to care.

There's a knock at the door. Castiel takes his leisurely time going to answer it; it's probably just Becky about to do her monthly maternal cleaning of his apartment or Bela with her newest relic.

To Castiel's surprise, it's exactly the one person he never wanted to see again, not after _that_ job.

"Mr. Novak. I saw you—" started Dean Winchester.

"I remember." Castiel knows Dean all too well for his liking.

"I'd like to ask you a few questions."

"I'm not in a talking mood right now." Castiel starts closing the door, but Dean puts out his hand, stopping it.

Dean pulls out his badge, fully aware that he could lose his job for this. "Please, Mr. Novak."

Castiel walks away, leaving the door half-open. "Always a catch," he mumbles to himself.

There are symbols scratched into the doorframe. Dean recognizes a few from Sam's sketchbook as he enters the shabby apartment.

The condo doesn't seem to have been renovated since 1955, and the furniture reminds Dean of the crappy motel rooms he knew all too well growing up.

The only decorations Dean can identify are a row of five-gallon water jugs wrapping all the way around the room, each one with a rosary floating in the water. A thick line of salt is poured on every windowsill, and more of those symbols are painted on the windows and doors in what looks like red and black paint. The ceiling even has what looks like a pentagram painted on it.

"My brother was murdered." Dean decides to be blunt. Castiel doesn't seem like the kind of guy who'd tolerate bullshit.

"Sorry to hear that." Castiel flops into a chair, taking another drag of his cigarette.

"He was a patient at Ravenscar's psych ward. He jumped off the roof."

Castiel extinguishes his cigarette, rubbing the lit end into the table. "Thought you said he was murdered."

"Sam wouldn't have taken his own life."

"A mental patient killing himself. Wow, that'd be crazy." Castiel wasn't kidding about not being in the mood for chat; he's never been particularly talkative and sees no reason to start.

Dean plays the second-to-last card he's got in his deck. He pulls the last drawing Sam ever did out of the sketchbook, tossing it on the table in front of Castiel.

"I know the circles you travel in. Demonology, the occult, the supernatural. And you wanna know something else a little spooky? Sammy, well, Sam thought he was psychic. Thought he was a monster hunter. And you wanna know something else a little weird? Few hours before he died, he become real paranoid, talking about how I had to find this guy in this picture. Said his name was Castiel," Dean starts.

"Ever consider that maybe he really was psychic?" Castiel can't help himself; he's a little interested now.

"I think someone got to him, some kind of cult or legion, brainwashed him into stepping off that roof. And I think you had something to do with it."

Castiel laughs. "Sounds like a theory, Detective. A wrong theory, but still a theory. I don't know who this Sam kid is. Good luck on finding your guy, though."

"I thought that with your background, you could at least point me in the right direction." Dean's aware that he sounds a little desperate, but he isn't too proud to beg a little. He never has been, not when it came to Sam.

"Okay, sure." Castiel jerks his thumb at the door.

Normally this is the point where whoever Castiel's being rude to will decide to just go away, but Castiel's finally met his match when it comes to stubbornness. Dean stands steadfast, not even blinking.

"He didn't commit suicide. Sam was a devout Catholic. Do you understand what that means? If he'd killed himself…"

"His soul would go straight to Hell, where he'd suffer in eternal torment on the rack, screaming in brutal agony as demons tore at his soul. Sound about right?" Castiel is more intimate with Hell then he'd like to admit—he could go into a lot more detail about the eternal torment concept.

"Damn you." Dean smacks the cup holding the spider over, the glass shattering against the force of the blow. He leaves, slamming the door in his wake.

Castiel had seen enough. He could feel the mass of anger and power that was Dean storming off, roiling just at the surface.

The wind outside picks up as the ground begins to tremble, the jugs of holy water shaking. Massive shadows blur past the windows, too fast for a human's eye to really perceive the creatures they belonged to.

But despite his currently practically-human, Castiel _isn't_ human. He's out the door before Dean even manages to get the fifty yards from the bowling alley Castiel lives above to the safety of his car.

"Detective!"

Dean slows down a little, frowning. Obviously, despite Castiel's appearance, he wasn't the one Sam had been talking about.

"Do you believe in angels?"

Dean stops altogether. "Stay on your meds, man."

"What about demons?"

_Sammy talked about demons. About their black eyes and powers and the way their souls had been twisted by Hell_, the little voice in the back of Dean's head whispers. "No." It sounds a lot more confident than Dean feels.

"Look, just… Humor me. Demons and angels have to possess somebody to do anything. Those are the rules. But see, for angels, they need permission to possess someone, and not just anyone can handle hosting an angel. They're called vessels. It's… It's like hosting a nuclear bomb inside of your body. Some people are capable of it, and others aren't."

Dean nods, starting back towards his car. "And?"

"Well, you see, for someone to start the Apocalypse, they'd need a very specific, very special vessel for an archangel."

"So?"

Castiel is getting slightly annoyed with Dean's monosyllabic answers. "Did Sam ever talk about anyone named Lucifer?"

"Didn't you say that Sam was just a mental patient?" Dean reaches for his car keys as the streetlight overhead flickers before dying out altogether.

Castiel knows what's coming, but even so, the way the other streetlights die one by one, leaving the street in almost total darkness, still lets an edge of fear creep in.

"It's a power outage." Dean shrugs, clearly trying to keep his calm.

"Not likely. We should go. Now." Castiel grabs Dean by the elbow, yanking him roughly towards the last point of light on the street—the Christian gift shop across the street.

Dean can hear what sounds like the barking of dogs and smell something like intense rotten eggs, and he can't help it, he's curious. "What is that?"

"Something that should go right back to Hell." Castiel shoves the matchbox with the beetle inside of it into Dean's hands. "Because your gun isn't really going to help. If it gets too bad, shake the box. Should give you some protection. Close your eyes."

"Why?" Dean still manages to sound like a petulant child, even in the face of literal Hell. Castiel would laugh if he wasn't so busy trying to save Dean's life.

"Suit yourself." This is dangerous, stupid, and probably a little reckless. But honestly? Castiel's at the point where he doesn't actually care anymore.

Dean doesn't listen, of course, not even as Castiel presses the edge of his blade to his skin. Not even as Castiel dips his fingers into his own blood and paints one of those weird symbols on the glass shop window behind them.

With his non-injured arm, Castiel flicks up a flame on his lighter.

Six Hellhounds, giant masses of pure shadow, sit on their haunches, waiting for the attach command.

Behind them stands the girl who had the room across from Sam in the hospital, still wearing her hospital gown and slippers. Ruby, her name had been, right? Her eyes were solid black, just as they were in all of Sam's drawings.

_Oh, God._

_Sam had been right._

Dean promptly vomits all over the sidewalk, ignored by both Castiel and Ruby.

She puts a hand on her hip, smiling at them.

"Ruby." Castiel staggers slightly as he takes a step forward. "Whore."

"Castiel." Ruby doesn't look terribly threatening, a pretty woman, but now Dean's scrambling to remember all the awful things Sam had said Ruby had done. "Asshole."

"Good-bye, bitch." Castiel presses his blood-covered palm to the center of the symbol, and with a flash of light and a scream, Ruby and the Hellhounds were gone.

The lights flickered back on with a pop.

Dean threw up again.

"Don't worry. Happens to everybody. It's the sulfur."

"What the hell were those things?"

Castiel lights another cigarette. "Demon bitch and her rent-a-Hellhounds."

"That's impossible."

"I don't think Ruby was here for me, either. Do you really believe that your brother wouldn't commit suicide?"

"Sam? Never in a million years."

"Let's make sure. Let's see if he's in Hell."

* * *

><p>Dean's suddenly overwhelmingly aware of just how dingy his little apartment is as he leads Castiel in.<p>

It's not even a real _apartment_, it's a room in an old no-tell motel that got converted to residences. Ever since his father had taken Sam and him on the cross-country trip to track down their mother's killer, Dean had always felt more comfortable in motels and hotels than he has in houses and condos. This happened to be a great compromise.

But it's still shitty, nothing but two queen beds and a desk with a dresser and a bathroom and what tried to pass itself off as a kitchenette. The wallpaper, patterned with what might be fruit, is sun-faded and peeling off of the walls. All the furniture is from IKEA, sleek and modern, stuff Sam had picked out with Dean so that if—_when_, Dean had thought at the time—Sam had been released from the hospital, Sam would feel more at home.

Still, it's Dean's, and it's all Dean's got. He fills up the biggest pan he owns with water, just like Castiel had asked, hopes it's big enough for whatever it is Castiel needs it for.

"Don't have any hot water, but at least it's room temperature." He sets the pan on the floor in front of the chair like Castiel had told him to, feeling slightly ridiculous.

Castiel is rifling through Sam's things in their box on Dean's desk. He pulls out the little scrapbook of their family pictures, thumbing through the pages. There aren't many pictures, only seven—one of a baby Sam being held by what must have been his mother, a family picture in front of a house, and a few photos of Sam and Dean together as kids in front of Castiel recognized as Dean's car.

"These all of Sam's things?"

"Yeah." Dean decides not to tell Castiel about the sketchbook, not just yet.

"Do you have any recent pictures of Sam?"

Dean nods as he fumbles with his wallet, delicately pulling the photograph out.

A much happier, much less stressed Dean is standing beside a ball of twine that claims to be the world's largest, his arm thrown over the shoulder of what looks like a shaggy-haired, moose-sized version of Dean—_Sam_. Both of the men are smiling, Sam looking like he was caught mid-laugh. Castiel feels a little twinge of agony stir in his gut for his own brothers as he studies Sam, wonders just how close the brothers had been.

"Thank you." Castiel clutches the picture, closing his eyes as he sits down, easing his feet into the pan of water. "I need you to leave."

"What?"

"Leave. Get out of the apartment. I'll be gone maybe a millisecond at most, but…"

"Okay." At this point, Dean's not about to argue. He's tired and he's just been caught in a fight between a demon and some Hellhounds and whatever the _fuck_ Castiel is, Dean isn't even sure he knows anymore, so you know what? Castiel seems like he knows he's doing, so Dean is just going to let Castiel do whatever he needs to do.

He's pulling the door shut when everything freezes.

* * *

><p>Castiel's been to Hell what seems like a hundred times, but it doesn't change how much he hates it.<p>

When he was an angel, he could feel the way the corrupting stink of Hell ate away at his Grace, trying to steal it and twist it. It was torture in the purest sense of the word, his very essence being groped and probed by these creatures of shadow and sin, as if by stealing his wholesomeness they could reclaim their own.

Now, it's not quite as painful, but it's still just as awful.

Castiel knows he's headed here the minute his mortal body finally gives out, and he knows that every single demon here would love to get their hands on his soul.

_An angel's soul_, they coo, _how lovely and beautiful_, _didn't ever think angels had souls, but he's not a real angel is he, do you think we can make it one of ours, do you think we can break him and torture him and oh can you imagine the loveliness, how beautiful such a bright strong soul would look all carved up as he took the razor from us and the silver of him tarnishes to black?_

Castiel's on a mission, though. He isn't here to listen to demons whisper and souls scream. He isn't here to look at the way millions of souls stretch out on the racks here, the way demons torture them. The way this is a twisted, broken version of the real world, all ice and dust and wind and screams and horror and flesh and bone.

He's just got to find Sam. That's all. He grips the picture in his hand tighter, searching for a match for the aura of Sam that glows off the picture.

And then, he feels it, that spark within his powers that rings with the presence of Sam, and Castiel _knows_ now.

Sam is standing on the edge of the roof, turned back to look at Castiel, expression oddly serene.

"Sam." Castiel's barely speaking about a whisper, but he knows Sam can hear him.

"Castiel," Sam whispers back, scratching at his wrist before yanking off the hospital bracelet, letting it flutter off in the wind towards Castiel.

And then, Sam jumps.

Castiel realizes too late that he's been encircled, trapped by demons, their black eyes curious. He has maybe ten seconds before they pounce, and the descent down here has drained him.

He sees the bracelet tumbling back towards him, and he makes his choice.

* * *

><p>Author's Notes: Thank you to all of you lovely people who read, review and alert this!<p> 


	6. I Know What You Did Last Summer

Dean doesn't even have the time to finish closing the door before Castiel shouts "Dean!" in between fits of coughing.

Castiel is hunched over in the chair, something held tightly in his hand, coughing up blood and bile, smoke and the odor of sulfur pouring off of him.

"What the hell…" Dean doesn't know what to do, and not for the first time tonight, he feels useless.

"Brothers betrayed…"

Dean kneels in front of Castiel. "What did you say?"

"You were brothers, Dean, brothers who betrayed each other…"

"Jesus, Cas!" Dean can't quite say where the nickname came from, but he likes 'Cas' a hell of a lot more than 'Castiel'.

"He killed himself." Castiel relaxes his fist, revealing the plastic hospital bracelet. Dean snatches it from his hand.

_Winchester, Sam_. Sam's patient number. His age. His sex. Date of birth. Date of admission.

Dean just stares at the bracelet, numb. "How… How is that possible?"

"I need to eat."

* * *

><p>Zachariah is damned good at what he does.<p>

He knows it.

Serving Heaven is in his bones; he's known it since he heard the first whispers all those years ago.

He's been in the game for years and years now, since he was seventeen. It took Zachariah a few years to work out all the kinks in the system, but now he's got a whole network laid out, informants and exorcists and assassins and hunters and spies and relic collectors, all connected.

The voices can still be too much, though. Humans weren't met to hear the private conversations of angels and demons. Of course, Zachariah's gotten good at controlling it—admittedly, with the help of a lot of alcohol—but sometimes, he can't help the way the edge of paranoia sets in.

Today, standing in the morgue, looking down at the body of Sam Winchester, Zachariah wishes he hadn't decided to try to do this sober.

He pulls back the sheet covering the corpse after double-checking the toe-tag, examining _Winchester, Sam E_. The kid looks like he'd been relatively healthy, tall and fit, shaggy brown hair and smile lines.

Zachariah picks up the corpse's wrist, about to mumble the spell to find what exactly had happened to _Winchester, Sam E._, when the voices kick in full-blast. He drops the wrist, watching in horror as a sigil appears there.

He falls to his knees, mumbling, fingers trembling as he struggles to open the flask he keeps hidden in his coat.

Nothing comes out.

He'd filled it this morning, hadn't he? He had to have, right?

But nothing continues to come out, and the security guard walks in.

"Hey! What're you doing in here?"

Zachariah pushes himself off of the floor, taking a running start. There's a convenience store less than a block away, he'll get there fast…

He ignores the way that the voices hiss at him, ignores the way the clerk behind the counter of the store yells at him as he reaches for the first bottle of beer he comes across. He pulls the top off and presses it to his lips, as if it was the last drop of water during a drought.

Nothing comes out.

Zachariah throws the bottle aside, reaches for another—still nothing emerges from the bottles.

He tries everything, anything—the tequila, the wine, the whiskey—yet nothing changes. The alcohol goes everywhere but his lips and mouth.

He gags on air, even as bile works its way up his throat.

* * *

><p>Then, Zachariah knows.<p>

Anna watches as Zachariah collapses to the floor, liquor and vomit pooling around him. The dying man grabs for a bottle opener from a display rack desperately, mumbling to himself even as the store clerk shouts to him about calling ambulances and hospitals.

She watches in mild disinterest as Zachariah carves something into his palm, blood joining the puddle of bodily fluids. Her job here is almost done. Anna likes her work, but truth be told, sometimes it bores her. She would prefer justice to be dealt the way it was long ago, when she might have been the righteous fist of God.

Instead, she is forced to play her part quietly and subtly—only Castiel, her fallen brother, seems to understand what she could do if she desired to break free of the role selected for her.

Her job, however, does have some perks, and killing a man like Zachariah, a drunken speaker of false tongues, is enough like the old ways of justice that Anna copes.

After all, what comes next for her in this cosmic performance is rather to her liking.


	7. Good God, Ya'll

Castiel shovels the last forkful of pancake into his mouth eagerly. Food took him a while to get the hang of when he first became mortal, but he's taken a liking to some mortal foods. Pancakes drowned in syrup happen to be among his favorites.

"I wasn't always a human." Castiel says it slowly; he doesn't want Dean to go shock. Tonight has been quite a night, even by Castiel's standards.

"Oh." Dean stares down at his own plate of eggs likes he suddenly finds them fascinating.

"I used to be an angel. I was a…supernatural foot soldier, of sorts. I had hundreds of brothers, Dean, and we all served together, serving our Father and taking care of the business.

"But sometime after Michael had Lucifer locked in Hell, it all went wrong. God… God isn't here anymore, Dean. He hasn't been for some time. I found that out the hard way. Do you know, Dean, that only five beings have seen God? Lucifer, Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, and Joshua. No one else has ever seen Him."

There is a broken quality to Castiel's voice, in his expression, as he stares down at the empty plate in front of him. "Now it's just a sad mockery. It's all a bureaucracy. And then… Then they kicked me out. They kicked me out because I told the truth. Dean, can you even imagine the power that I once held? I took out entire legions of demons with barely any effort. And then Michael told me that for revealing the truth to the others, I had to Fall. Said it was blasphemy.

"So he threw me out. Can you imagine what it was like, Dean, to be immortal, nothing but raw power, and then get reduced to nothing but flesh and bone? I get _hungry_, Dean. I get tired. I'm addicted to cigarettes. I'm an alcoholic. I'm…mortal. _Human_."

The look of disgust and contempt on Castiel's face is enough to make Dean feel a little wary. He tries to go for humor. "Welcome to the club."

Castiel laughs. "I used to be a member of a much better club, Dean. A powerful, influential club. See, when I die here, I will go straight to Hell. I've sinned and for that I must suffer."

"Oh."

"Of course, I'm not going to go to Hell."

Dean jerks his gaze up from his eggs. "How the hell are you gonna pull that off?"

"If I do enough good, I could regain entry to Heaven."

"So you're gonna buy your way into Heaven."

"Essentially."

Dean eats a forkful of eggs at last, not really hungry but wanting something to do with his hands. He swallows before he speaks—he does have some manners, after all. "So Hell—" he starts.

But then a lackluster ringtone rendition of 'Smoke on the Water' interrupted, Dean's cell phone ringing.

"Winchester. …Yeah. I'll be right there."

* * *

><p>"Guard spotted him looking at a body, before he ran across the street. Came in here and had a go at the entire stock. He drowned himself in alcohol in under a minute." Jo doesn't bother with any insignificant details; she knows Dean's style. If he wants any extra information, he'll ask.<p>

Castiel crosses the police line without hesitation, giving the cop that tries to stop him a look that makes even Dean wary.

"Hey, you can't be here!" Jo looks to Dean for back-up, but Dean just shrugs and nods his head.

"He's okay."

Castiel kneels beside Zachariah. The man had almost as many paranormal connections as Crowley, and he'd only been working for about fifty-something years. Sure, Zachariah was a dick, but he didn't deserve this.

That's when Castiel realizes something is carved into Zachariah's palm—it's not a random wound, there looks like a pattern…

Castiel pulls a handkerchief from his pocket and presses it to the corpse's palm for a moment before peeling it off.

It takes him a moment to recognize the symbol: it's a simple circle, arrows inside swirling into the middle.

And that is when Castiel realizes just how deep the shit he's in is.

Because this sigil, so innocent-looking, is only used for one thing: bringing Satan himself topside.

Yeah. Castiel is _fucked_.

"I need to see where Sam died."

* * *

><p>Bela Talbot loves her job.<p>

She's one of those blessed few who found something that they're not only good at, but enjoy, and managed to make a living out of it.

A very, very good living out of it—Bela enjoys the finer things in life, and she never settles for less than the very best.

Of course, Bela does keep herself grounded, and she is endlessly practical when it comes to her work. When you're a master thief, you have to find out how to balance your own wants with sensibility.

This little room in a bowling alley, behind the lanes, isn't glamorous or fantastic.

However, it's terribly practical, and Bela's actually rather fond of the cramped space. It holds everything she could need in terms of the paranormal, and it's not as if Bela needs a big apartment or office. She's rarely in one place for more than three days.

Bela sits down at the desk, rifling through the papers for her latest job—regaining a lost magic staff for some private-investigator wizard in Chicago.

The sharp tones of her phone ringing pull Bela out of the researching lull she's settled into.

"Yes? Oh. Yes… Yes… Got it. I hope you know I'm adding another zero to my paycheck, Castiel…"

The symbol sketched in the margin of her notebook is not familiar to Bela, not at first sight, but the book of occult symbols is sitting on the desk beside her.

The Chicago job can wait.


	8. Red Sky at Morning

"Our dad thought Sam was faking it. Thought Sammy was just doing it all for attention. Made enough sense. But Sam was convinced. He'd talk to anyone who would listen about demons, witches, ghosts. Monsters. Things he thought he saw. He went to a shrink, but it didn't make a difference. He stopped talking for two months when he was thirteen."

The aquamarine pool looks innocent enough, shimmering under the ugly florescent lighting. It is, after all, nothing more than a cross-shaped therapy pool in a hospital. It's not as if it was magically going to transform into something evil after Sam took a swan dive from the roof into it.

"So you had him committed?" Castiel needs to know everything, anything. Sam and Dean, the brothers betrayed—and then the marks of Lucifer's rising…

Dean nods curtly. "Yeah."

Castiel kneels beside the pool, searching for any signs of any foul play. There are none, though, the place is clean. "Can I see his room?"

* * *

><p>The elevator ride up to the mental ward is quiet except for a brief interlude with an old bald man who can't stop coughing and exits at the oncology floor. It's a deep, strong cough that Castiel's all too familiar with: he's heard it come from within his own lungs before.<p>

Castiel makes a point of ignoring it, but that doesn't help, not really.

Once they're in the quiet of Sam's former room, though, Castiel's able to bury his own problems underneath the case.

"How long was Sam committed for?"

"The first time, it was a month. After that, Sam was in and out of the hospital. He'd get better, but then he'd get worse. He'd been here for about a year, actually, the longest he'd ever spent in one hospital. I, uh, I was in an accident, and Sam…regressed. Got paranoid and violent. They were going to send him to a lockdown institution, but Sam managed to pull it together last minute. Just like always." There's a flicker of something deep and dark across Dean's expression, bitterness in his voice, but it's gone before Castiel has a chance to really examine it.

When Dean speaks again, it's with his typical cockiness and bravado. "What was carved into that dead guy's hand, you think it had something to do with this? With Sam?"

The whole macho, man's-man attitude is nothing but a front, Castiel thinks to himself. He remains quiet, examining the empty closet and looking under the bed.

"I'm a cop, Cas. Remember?"

Castiel sweeps a hand over the light fixture. Nothing there, either. "You don't walk off the roof of a building without leaving something behind."

"And I showed you everything Sam left behind, but feel free to look." _Except your name, the name he whispered before he jumped._

"Well, maybe he left something else. A message, a letter. Something only you could find, not something a cop would find. You were his older brother, Dean. You said yourself that you practically raised him. I bet you two think a lot alike."

That deep, dark expression flickers across Dean's face again. "Sam was nothing like me."

"But you two were just alike once, when you were kids." Castiel steps closer to Dean. "You took care of Sam, didn't you, Dean? You knew everything about each other. You could start a sentence and he'd be able to finish it."

"That was a long time ago." Dean's a good two or three inches taller and about twenty pounds heavier than Castiel, but Castiel is officially invading his personal space, and suddenly he feels trapped.

"That kind of bond doesn't just disappear."

"Look, there's nothing here!"

Castiel grabs Dean's arm, pulls him up with supernatural speed and strength as he slams Dean's back into the wall. The fallen angel crowds him against the ugly off-white wallpaper, so close they're practically sharing breath.

"He planned his death right here, Dean. Right here. He stood right here and made his plan. He thought it up right here, in this exact spot. He knew you'd come. He counted on you to see what he saw, feel what he felt, know what he knew. What did he do, Dean?"

"How should I know?" Dean struggles, tries to push Cas off, but obviously he's using his goddamned angel mojo, because Dean can't make him so much as fucking _budge_.

Castiel leans in closer still, so close that Dean can pick out individual specks of blue in his eyes. "What did he do, Dean? You know what he did."

"I don't fucking know!"

"What would you do, Dean?"

"I don't know!"

"What would you do, Dean?"

"I don't know, I don't know!"

"You know, Dean. What would you do?"

"I don't know…"

"You know what he did, Dean. What did he do? You know, Dean, you know. What did he do, Dean?"

"I don't know…"

"What are you afraid of? What did he do, Dean? What did he do?"

The soft murmurs of the voices in the back of Dean's head are collecting, growing louder despite all the pills he's swallowed to keep them silent. "I… I don't fucking know, _I don't fucking know_!" Dean shoves Castiel, all the strength he's got, and finally, he breaks free, collapsing against the window.

It's silent in the room. For a long while, Castiel wonders if he's gone too far, broken the man he was hired to put back together.

"Our mother burned to death in Sammy's bedroom when he was a baby. I pulled him out of the fire. Dad was drunk and obsessed with finding the arsonist who lit the house on fire that night. We moved around so much… I took care of Sam. Don't you understand that? I took care of Sam. He was mine. _I raised Sammy_.

"I packed his lunch. I got him to school. I made him dinner. I helped him with his homework. I paid for his hospital stays and his shrink. He was my brother. Don't you understand that_? I took care of Sammy._ Not Dad, not Mom, not foster parents. Me. Dean.

"I did everything for him! I did everything, and no one ever understood it! He was mine. Mine. All I did was take care of Sam! I took care of him. I was always taking care of him. And that's all I ever did! That's all I could ever do! That's all I'm good for! That's all I know how to do! I took care of Sammy!"

Dean stares out the window, glassy-eyed, running a finger along the glass of the window. "When we were kids, we'd leave messages for each other on the windows. It was how we'd talk when we didn't want anyone to know what we were saying." He leans towards the window and exhales shakily.

Castiel watches in wonder as writing appears, illuminated by the sunlight.

_COR17:1_

* * *

><p>"There's no chapter seventeen in the Book of Corinthians…" Dean's aware he's speaking with the slow Southern slur he's tried to rid himself of all these years, aware that he's only working at half-speed.<p>

It must have been those pills Castiel had given him, had to be—Dean didn't know where Castiel had gotten tranquilizers, but he was grateful for them. The voices were gone, as were the odd massive wings that had appeared on Castiel's shadow.

"Corinthians goes to twenty-one acts in the Bibles in Hell."

"They… They have Bibles in Hell?" Dean starts giggling.

"It paints a very different views of Revelations. It's not the end of the world, not to Hell and its bitches, just their chance to challenge the angels and see who gets to rule the world…"

Castiel falls quiet as Bela find the verse in her copy of Hell's Bible ("I am a great thief, Castiel, of course I have a copy," she'd snapped at him when he asked if she had one), listening to her mumble Hell-speak on the speakerphone.

"Not good, Castiel. Certainly not good. 'The chained is given his choice of prisons.'"

"He can't."

"Well…"

"He can't open the cage himself, Bela. It's impossible for him to cross over unless all the seals are open."

Dean interrupts. "For who to cross over? Jesus?"

Castiel glares at him. "No. Satan."

"I found the symbol. It's engraved on his vessel's arm, a warning to all who might try to hurt him." Bela's voice is urgent, pleading, almost. "It's a seal in itself."

A tinny clanging noise distracts the thief for a moment, but Bela doesn't do anything more than glance quickly back and flinch slightly.

"Lucifer will forge his own kingdom of ice and blood…" The clanging noise echoed again, but when she look back, she saw nothing.

There were Devil's Traps everywhere, and salt lines at all thresholds; there was no way for anyone paranormal to get in. "In order for Lucifer to get free, sixty-six out of the six hundred and sixty-six seals must be broken. The first has be the Sinning of the Righteous Man. The last has to be the Death of the First One."

"That wouldn't be enough, though. To open the Cage, they would a vessel for Lucifer."

"Sam?" Dean suggests.

"It says…" Bela pauses in her reading as another, louder clang sounds. The machinery that runs the bowling lanes sprung to life, whirring and clashing.

"Bela?" Castiel's concerned now; something is clearly going on.

"Just because you don't have faith doesn't mean we don't. I have faith in you, Castiel. Understand?"

The line goes dead.

"Bela? Bela? Bela! Are you there?"

Bela pulls the shotgun she keep in a drawer of her desk out silently, kicking off her heels as she rises to her feet. "All right, let's settle this, once and for all. Come out, come out wherever you are!"

Castiel swears as he speeds the car up—he doesn't have a driver's license, and if he gets pulled over he's fucked, but something clearly was happening.

He pulls into the parking lot of the bowling alley before he can get caught, luckily. He breaks into a run as he dashes into the alley, leaving the stoned-out Dean to stumble awkwardly in his wake.

Castiel hears two gunshots, and then he knows it's too late, though he keeps on sprinting.

"Bela!"

By the time he gets to the small cave among the machinery the runs the bowling lanes, it's too late.

Bela is dead, sprawled out beside her desk, blood still oozing from the stab wound in her chest. Thin gashes cover her forearms, one long slash coloring her right cheek with rapidly congealing blood.

_I have faith in you, Castiel._

Castiel is beginning to wonder why anyone ever did.


	9. Submerged

Dean chugs down his cup of coffee, watching Castiel as the fallen angel finishes his third cigarette in thirty-five minutes. Cas will get lung cancer if he smokes so much, Dean thinks.

The tranquilizers have worn off, but Dean still feels fuzzy, the voices and visions still lurking in the darkest corners of his mind. He hopes desperately that the caffeine gives him the much-needed burst of energy it'll take to ignore them completely.

"It wasn't just Sam. I used to see things too. But you knew that."

"Go home, Dean."

"I need to know."

"You don't want to know what's out there. Trust me."

"I'm a lot stronger than Sam."

Cas tosses his cigarette out the open window before slamming it closed. Everyone around him is dead, and he's come to realize that the only friends he has left are Dr. Novak and Dean, if you could even really consider Dean his friend.

"Sam embraced his gift, Dean. You denied yours. Denial is a better idea. It's safer. You're still alive. Stay with me and that'll change. I don't need another ghost following me around."

"Then salt and burn my corpse, Cas! But they killed my brother. It was my job to take care of him, and I fucked up!"

Castiel turned around sharply. "Salt and burn? Where'd you get that from?"

"It was something I learned when I was a kid, how you get rid of ghosts. Salt and burn their bones. When we were kids, I used to pretend that I couldn't see things. When Sam was seven, the school sent him to a shrink. He'd beg me to tell them that I could see them too, that monsters were real. But I lied. I couldn't get taken away, couldn't let anyone take Sammy away. And eventually, I just stopped seeing things.

"It was my job to take care of Sam, and I left him alone. I abandoned him. I betrayed him. I need to know what he saw."

Castiel exhales slowly. He wants another cigarette, but he settles for pouring himself another cup of coffee. "Once you can see them, they can see you. There's no going back. Understand?"

"Yeah."

"Okay."

* * *

><p>Castiel makes sure the bathwater is warm, but not hot. Dean's first remembered trip to Hell could at least have a few comforts.<p>

Dean himself was taking off his work boots and emptying his pockets, deliberately not thinking about what he was preparing to do.

"Why water?" He peers into the claw-footed tub, but there's nothing in it but simple tap water.

"It's a universal conduit. Makes the transition from one world to the next easier. Get in the tub."

Dean barely fits in the tub, too broad and tall to squeeze in completely, but it's good enough, Castiel figures. "Normally only a small portion of the body has to be suspended, but you haven't had the training yet that would require."

"Wanted the crash course. So, uh, what's gonna happen?" Dean hasn't felt this awkward since, well, ever. He's always had some layer of protection, that thick casing of charm and bravado, but here, is Castiel's ancient relic of a bathtub, it peels away like dead skin. Dean feels more naked than he's ever felt, and he's still fully clothed.

Castiel smiles primly, kneeling at the edge of the tub. "You'll find out." _The dick. _"You have to lie down, Dean. You have to be fully submerged for it work."

"For how long?"

"As long as it requires. Time passes differently in Hell. Now take a deep breath."

And before Dean can raise a protest, ask another question, Castiel pushes him abruptly into the water.

Dean relaxes for a long moment, closing his eyes.

When he reopens them, though, nothing has changed. Castiel is still pinning him to the tub, staring down.

Dean desperately needs to breathe, his lungs burning. Dean pushes at Castiel's hand, but Castiel is frozen, locked into place. Something's wrong, something has to be wrong…

Dean struggles, thrashes water out of the tub. At last, he manages to knock Castiel over, though he remains frozen.

He rises to his feet, sucking in air frantically. Dean stumbles out of the bathtub…

And then the world around him shifts entirely.

Castiel knows immediately something is wrong with Dean when time restarts. Hell is a disturbing place; it's not as if Castiel expected him to be perfectly fine, but the trauma that radiates off of Dean is very different than the almost simpler trauma of Hell.

"Oh god. All of those people… All of those people…" Dean vomits for the second time in twenty-four hours, pressing his forehead to the cool white of the floor tiles in the aftermath. "I always knew… Sammy always knew… I've always known that I could see… I've always known… I…"

Dean stands up, head tilted and expression blank. Mindlessly, he twirls the thick silver band of his ring around his finger. "Someone was here."

Immediately, he breaks into a run.

Castiel follows him out of the apartment, down the hallway, into the bowling alley, and back into Bela's office.

"It was hers. Shiny. Pretty. A gift." Dean falls to his knees, staring vacantly ahead. Carefully, he reaches down through the metal grate floor.

He pulls out a gold ring engraved with Enochian.

Castiel doesn't need to read the lettering to know what it says, or use the remains of power he has left to find its owner. After all, there is only one ring like it in all of Creation. He knows exactly who it belongs to.

"Anna."


	10. All Hell Breaks Loose Part One

Dean plays with the ring as Castiel shifts through the collection of relics, weapons and papers in Bela's office area. "Can you just kill her? Isn't there some balance thing? You know, demons and angels?"

"They tipped the scales when they started killing my friends. I'm just going to…add some counter-weight." Castiel retrieves an ancient-looking clay jar and a matchbook from a drawer and pours a little of it on the floor. He strikes a match.

The oil bursts into bright yellow-orange flame as Castiel drops the match. It's mesmerizing. Dean's not even sure what a pitcher of oil is going to do to Anna, but staring at the fire, he's pretty sure it's going to be badass.

Castiel slips the matches into his pocket and the oil into a plain black backpack. "Do you know where Milton Enterprises is?"

* * *

><p>They park directly in front of the entrance to the Milton Enterprises office tower.<p>

Castiel leans into Dean, as if they're about to kiss, and Dean starts to raise a protest, but Castiel merely examines the horned mask pendant hanging from a simple leather cord around Dean's neck.

"Who gave you that necklace?"

"Sam. It was a Christmas present from when we were kids."

"It's a very powerful amulet of protection. Think of it as a bulletproof vest." Castiel pulls back and shrugs on his backpack. "You're staying in the car."

* * *

><p>Anna stares out the window as she brushes nonexistent dirt off of her pantsuit.<p>

"Hello, Castiel." She feels her fallen brother's presence permeate the room—his Grace always burned differently, not tinted with the stench of rot the way the other Fallen ones were, but _different_.

"How is Lucifer crossing over, you piece of shit?"

"That's no way to talk to an angel, Castiel." She twists her wrist, and suddenly Castiel is pinned to the glass wall of windows.

* * *

><p>"Stay in the car, stay in the car…" Dean repeats it to himself like a mantra. "Stay in the car…"<p>

Castiel has been gone five minutes now, and that's way too long in Dean's opinion.

"Stay in the car…" He clicks the safety off of his gun and stuffs it in his pocket as he gets out of the Impala.

"Fuck staying in the car."

* * *

><p>Anna tightens the noose of her powers she has looped around Castiel's neck. "Don't fight it, Castiel. Enjoy it. This is the righteous wrath of God."<p>

Castiel's desperate for air now, but he continues to hunt through the inner pocket of his coat, fingers searching blindly for the hard plastic edge of the box-cutter.

At last, he finds it, grasping it tightly. Castiel's shaking badly but all he has to do is reopen the cut he made previously, if only he can hold the blade steady.

"This is the death selected for you by our Father Himself…" Anna continues to deliver her monologue, seemingly blind to the struggle of the dying Castiel.

Castiel stabs desperately at his own arm. The box-cutter falls to the floor with a clatter as he scoops up a fistful of his own blood and presses it into his stomach.

Bright white light fills the room as Anna is flung backwards onto the table, skin and hair singed. Castiel falls free from the wall. Immediately he stumbles to Anna, kneeling on the table beside her.

"You're going to Hell. I'll make sure of it…"

Castiel grins as he pulls the jar of oil from his bag and pours it around them in a circle. "True. But you're not. I can only imagine the tortures Michael will order you to suffer for helping set Lucifer free. Speaking of which, how exactly is Lilith going to break him out?"

"What are you doing?" Anna's voice is rough now, blurring with her True Voice.

"This is the righteous wrath of God, Anna. I'm handing you over to the authorities."

"Please, Castiel… You know what they'll do to me… Just kill me!"

Castiel tosses a lit match onto the oil. The flames eerily illuminate the scene as he pulls out the only other thing in his bag: a single piece of white chalk. "It will lead to true forgiveness, Anna. You will be welcomed into Heaven."

"You're not an angel anymore! It won't work!"

"Just tell me how Lucifer is crossing over and I'll kill you instead." Anna is silent. "Okay." Castiel starts drawing the Enochian necessary to summon Uriel and Michael on the table around them. He takes his time with each character, giving Anna plenty of time to reflect on her choices.

Yet Anna remains quiet. At last, Castiel is finished with the sigils and he starts to recite the chant. The walls tremble and the floor shakes as he speaks.

"Lilith… Lilith broke the seals on Lucifer's Cage in Hell!"

"How many of them has she broken?"

"Sixty-five. To break the last one, she needs the vessel."

"You know, Anna, I'm Fallen. I can't summon an angel anymore, no this way." Castiel shoves everything back into his bag and steps out of the ring of holy fire. "Enjoy your stay here."

Anna laughed brokenly. "My work here is complete, Castiel."

"Why are you laughing?"

Dean steps into the room, gun aimed at Anna.

"He was my mission, Castiel. And you brought him right to us."

Castiel pulls his angel blade from the inside pocket of his coat and stabs Anna exactly twice, blinding light flooding the room as Castiel grabs Dean by the shoulder and runs with him out of the room.

* * *

><p>"Does this walking fast mean you found something?" Dean's in pretty good shape, but he's been running on fumes for the past several hours, and this not-quite-jog is almost too much.<p>

"You and Sam are of the bloodline necessary to host the archangels Lucifer and Michael. You were the brothers betrayed—the eldest, who betrayed his younger brother by denying the truth—making you the perfect fit for Michael and Sam for Lucifer.

"A few months ago you were attacked by a serial killer and got hit by a truck. Medically, you were dead for two minutes. You were revived, though you were almost brain-dead and permanently comatose. And you, Dean, were in Hell.

"You picked up the razor and begun torturing souls in exchange for being spared from torture yourself. You broke the first seal of the Apocalypse. I didn't know that until now.

"I am the one who gripped you tight and raised you from Perdition. I rebuilt your body and restored your soul. I was hired by Zachariah, the man who drowned himself in alcohol last night, to do it. He could hear the conversations of the angels in Heaven. He said he'd heard it that the one who brought back Dean Winchester would earn great favor in Heaven.

"And now sixty-five of the sixty-six seals on Lucifer's prison have been broken, and all because I wanted back into Heaven." Castiel presses the button for the elevator as he runs a hand through his hair.

"But Sam's dead. Why does any of this matter now? I thought you said that I was Michael's vessel."

"It's the bloodline that matters. You are more of a fit for Michael than for Lucifer, seeing your position in the brothers betrayed, but you'd be just as effective as a vessel for Lucifer. Where's the amulet?"

Dean glances down at his chest. The pendant is gone. "I don't know. Maybe it fell off?" He blanches.

"What's wrong?"

"I don't know. I just feel…weird."

Abruptly, Dean is yanked backwards, the plaster of the walls and metal of the elevator warping and leaving a comically man-shaped hole as he was pulled through them.

Castiel took off after him, running as fast as he could, pushing supernatural strength through his body. Electrical wires and pipes shot streams of water and sparks everywhere. It was a deathtrap.

He chases after Dean through the ruins of cubicles, meeting rooms and a bathroom, never pausing. At last Dean hit the glass window and flew out of the building. Castiel skids to a halt.


	11. All Hell Breaks Loose Part Two

**Author's Notes**: Sorry this took so long to post!

* * *

><p>The Crossroads was six miles away from Milton Enterprises. Castiel would have simply popped into existence in Crowley's office if he hadn't know that he was going to need all his remaining power for what he had planned.<p>

Instead, Becky drove him there, and this time, when she insisted on coming with him, Castiel just nodded and made sure she had a gun.

The demon guarding the door flashes the back of the card to Castiel.

"Bird on a ladder."

"Sorry…" Before the demon had a chance to finish his sentence, though, Castiel punches him in the face and murmurs an Enochian exorcism. The demon smokes out of the body immediately.

"Wait here, Becky."

"Okay." The nerdy woman stands over the now-dead bodyguard and laughs smugly as Castiel headed for Crowley's office. "Who's a rat in a dress now?"

Castiel kicks down the door to Crowley's office easily, fueled by rage and a little of his power.

"Have you lost your mind?" Crowley rises to his feet immediately, glass of scotch falling from his hand. He flicked his wrist as if to use his powers.

Castiel pulled his angel blade from his coat and shook his head. "Don't. I need to use the Chair."

"I can't. This is neutral land, Castiel. I don't want to upset the balance."

"Fuck the balance!"

Immediately Castiel is slammed into the wall by a force of Crowley's power. The demon flings Castiel's blade aside easily. "Are you insulting me in my own house?" Crowley is clearly pissed off, his eyes red-rimmed solid black. He snaps his fingers and Castiel feels his ribs shatter, the pain intense but passable if Castiel repeats his mantra of _Dean Dean Dean Dean_ in his head.

"It's bullshit, Crowley. You're the only one who's playing by the rules. Bela, Zachariah, they were your friends!"

Crowley snaps again, and this time it's Castiel's femurs that break.

"Consider it a last request!"

The demon snaps one last time, and Castiel's fingers and toes splinter.

"Lilith is free!"

"I'm aware."

"She's going to raise Lucifer. She has the vessel."

Crowley stops for a moment. "Lucifer?"

"You know, Satan."

"I know who Lucifer is, moron." The demon takes a step back and smiles as Castiel feels his bones mend themselves. "You play a dangerous game, Castiel."

* * *

><p>"The problem with Lucifer is that he hates everything. When he's done smiting humanity, he's going to spike anything with black eyes." Crowley taps the impressive iron door twice.<p>

The door swings open with a groan, revealing a room twice the size of the Crossroads' public club area, packed from the floor to the ceiling with everything and anything, from priceless pieces of art to torture weapons literally from the depths of Hell.

This, as Crowley once explained to Castiel, is his personal collection of relics, his favorites among the thousands he's accumulated.

Crowley flicks his wrist, clearing a path to what Castiel's dubbed the Chair instantly.

"Forgot how big it was." Castiel keeps the sudden apprehension he's feeling out of his voice.

"Three hundred souls of the damned passed through that particular electric chair, you know. I know about ninety of them personally."

Castiel drags the massive chair to the center of the room and flops ungracefully into it while Crowley prepares.

"How long has it been since you've surfed?" The demon sets bucket to fill with water as he pours two tumblers full of Craig, which, as far as Crowley was concerned, is the only thing worth drinking.

"I can do it."

"This has more to do with Dean Winchester than Lucifer, doesn't it?"

"This is definitely mostly about Lucifer."

"I'm the King of the Crossroads, darling. I know a lie when I hear it."

"I… have become attached to the human in my charge, yes."

Crowley offers a glass of scotch to Castiel, who swallows his down faster even than the demon.

"Ready?"

Castiel nods and sets his tumbler down on the floor beside the Chair before he takes off his shoes and socks.

Crowley dumps the bucket of water over the floor and the fallen angel's feet. He smashes a light bulb, leaving the glowing wire exposed.

"Sure about this, mate?"

"No."

Crowley slams the shattered light bulb into the water anyways.

* * *

><p>The current hits Castiel with the force only electric shock can carry.<p>

Immediately, the world around him flashes between the fires of Hell and the blindingly white light of Heaven, shattered into fragments.

The scene flashes to Dean, strung up on a rack in Hell, his skin hanging off of his body in shreds. "Just snatch the razor from my hand, Dean. Just say yes." The taunting demon—Alistair, Castiel recognizes—waves the weapon enticingly over Dean's face.

"Yes." It's barely above a whisper, but loud enough.

"What's that, Dean?"

"Yes, you son of a bitch. Yes. Just let me down! Give me the fucking razor!"

"That's a good boy."

It shifts to Sam, sitting in a hospital room, scratching the word _no_ repeatedly on every available surface using what looks like a stolen medical scalpel. It's already carved into his arms, legs and stomach from what Castiel can see, the cuts still oozing blood.

"No, no, no, I'll never say yes, I'll never say yes, not to you… No… No…" Sam looks out the window for a moment. "If I'm dead, I can't say yes, can I? No. No."

It shifts again, this time to the pool area of the hospital where Sam had flung himself to his death.

Lilith, wearing some poor little blonde girl's meatsuit, stands in the far corner of the room, eyes solid white.

"Crowley!" Castiel shouts.

* * *

><p>The demon yanks him out of the Chair instantly, pulling him out of the vision. "Any luck?"<p>

"I found Lilith, if you'd consider that luck."

"I imagine our Teen Beat model can't be far behind her."

A loud, girlish squeal pulls both Crowley and Castiel into the real world. "Oh. My. God. You're Crowley, aren't you?"

"I told you to stay in the lobby, Becky." Not that Castiel really expected Becky to listen to him, but his sort-of apprentice didn't have to know that.

"But he's the King of the Crossroads!"


	12. When the Levee Breaks

Crowley pulls a cigar box from the locked case, carefully pulling the gun hidden inside out.

"A Colt?" Castiel watches the demon load it.

"No, _the_ Colt. It's the most powerful weapon around, short of an angel's blade." Becky gapes at the gun like it's the most amazing thing she's ever seen.

When Becky realizes that Crowley and Castiel are staring at her, she shrugs. "I help Chuck research for his books. I mean, he does get these amazing creative visions, but he's not the sharpest tool in the shed when it comes to research. The Colt can kill anything, from demons to Wendigos.

Castiel is immediately interested. "Will it work on an archangel like Lucifer?"

"Haven't really had a chance to test it out yet. Archangels aren't exactly running rampant in the streets."

"Even if the Colt works, they wouldn't have left Dean with only Lilith to guard him. Demons are most vulnerable when made to manifest. Holy water will not only make a demon manifest, but also burn their host body's skin. Certain objects can be used by even the unordained to bless commonly occurring waters, even rain." Becky switches her gaze to a tapestry of demons torturing people in the fires of Hell. "You wouldn't have a few rosaries or a blessed cross lying around, would you? We could take them with us."

Castiel blinks, staring at Becky.

"No offense, Castiel, really, I just don't think it's a good idea, you know… Going on a solo mission to save the world. I don't know what Mr. Crowley thinks, but…"

Crowley laughs as he sips his Craig. "Take her, mate."

* * *

><p>Crowley shoves the cloth-wrapped crucifix into Becky's hands. "I'm loaning my Hounds to you two. I can assure you that all of my employees are accounted for, but I can't speak for all of Hell, and I know Lilith can't be alone. For the record, Becky, if you get back, contact me about employment."<p>

"You mean, you want me to work with you? I could get into the club?" Becky's eyes go wide.

Castiel rolls his eyes, a bad habit he picked up from a teenaged client a while back.

"Maybe." Crowley snaps his fingers and immediately the howling of Hellhounds echoes through the street in front of the Crossroads.

Time to get a move on.

* * *

><p>Dean crashes into the pool with a massive splash. Instantly, he's on his feet, gun aimed and at the ready.<p>

But there's no one around. No Castiel. No Anna. No black-eyed demons.

Just Dean.

For some reason, that unnerves him more than if he'd crash-landed into a nest of demons.

"My name is Lilith, Dean." The voice is high-pitched and girlish.

A little blonde girl with solid white eyes emerges from the shadows in the corner, smiling serenely. "And I have one really easy question for you."

"Fuck you!" Dean shoots her right in the chest, trying to ignore the dramatic way the scarlet blood soaks the white lace of what looks like a First Communion dress. _She's not a little girl, she's a monster, she's not a little girl, she's a monster…_

Lilith flicks her wrist and the gun goes flying out of Dean's hands.

He scrambles, trying to get out of the pool, but Lilith just watches him, pinning him down with invisible force.

Dean wonders menially if Sam had been warning him of this all along.

* * *

><p>Castiel takes one last drag of a cigarette before tossing it casually to the ugly vinyl of the hospital floor.<p>

"What's that?" Becky pauses, head cocked towards the strange garble of a language echoing down the hallway.

"Hell-speak. You know what to do, right?"

Becky gulps heavily grip tightening on her shotgun. "Okay."

"Sure." Castiel smiles sadly as he watches Becky, his longest-lasting friend, head down the hallway.

This is a suicide mission, Castiel knows. There is no way to kill Lucifer that won't kill him, too. The Colt is going to fail, of course—it's powerful, but Castiel's felt it out with his Grace and knows that it's nowhere enough to ice the Devil. It'd be like shooting arrows at a nuke.

No, this is going to come down to fallen-angel-on-fallen-angel violence.

Dean is fucked, of course. Castiel has played out a million different scenarios in his head, but they've all added up to the same thing: Castiel is dead, Lucifer is obliterated, and Dean is either mentally destroyed from hosting an archangel or dead.

"One last show." It's more to himself than it is to anyone who might be listening, but he thinks that some of his Heavenly brothers might hear it.

Castiel rallies the last remnants of his Grace, every molecule that remains, and steadies himself.

_One last show, indeed._

* * *

><p>Becky pries the cover on the emergency sprinkler water supply off with no real difficulty.<p>

At first, the cross refuses to fit, but after finagling with it for a minute, it drops into the water with a splash.

She wonders where Castiel is.

* * *

><p>"My name is Castiel, and I'm an angel of the Lord."<p>

Castiel shuts the doors to the physical therapy room behind himself, two of Crowley's Hellhounds at his sides.

The swarm of demons, possessing everyone from toddlers to a World War One relic, turns to stare at him with their soulless black eyes. "You are in violation of the balance. Leave immediately, or I will deport you."

He pulls a chair up to the center of the room and stands on it. There is a message to be sent. "And I will deport _all_ of you."

No one moves.

Castiel flicks his lighter into life.

"Go back to Hell."

He presses the flame to the smoke detector.

The sprinklers get a slow start, but once they're started, the effect is immediate.

"Holy water?" The artificial rain pours down on the demons, their flesh sizzling and smoking.

Castiel steps down from the chair and throws the lighter aside.

There are five rounds in the Colt, but Castiel has thirteen bullets in total. It's nowhere near enough to kill all these demons, but he only needs to get into the pool area.

He snaps his fingers and Crowley's Hellhounds attack, unaffected by the holy water.

Castiel starts towards the door to the physical therapy pool. He shoots his first demon with satisfaction, their meatsuit convulsing and glowing with red-orange light as they die.

He goes through the first clip quicker than he expected. It's been a while since he was able to act on such a large scale, and it feels good. He reloads and takes out more demons.

It's not until there's one demon left that Castiel realizes he's made a fatal mistake.

There is only one bullet left in the Colt.

Ruby, the last demon left, grins.

Castiel could easily exorcise her with a press of his fingers, but he's going to need every last ounce of Grace in his possession to take down Lucifer, and he needs this bullet to kill Lilith.

And Ruby fucking _knows_ that.

Before Castiel or Ruby can make a move, though, the demon is on the floor, a rock salt shell firmly embedded in her borrowed skull.

Becky slowly lowers her gun.

Castiel's sure he says it a lot, but he's never been so grateful to see Becky in all his millennia of life.


	13. Lucifer Rising

Lilith pushes Dean under the water, despite his struggling.

Abruptly the world twists and shifts, until Dean is no longer drowning in water in the pool.

He's merely standing on the bottom of an empty pool with a crowd of demons gathered around the edges. The wind blows hot on Dean's face, despite the ice that's formed in a corner of the pool.

He's in Hell.

Dean's no longer a stranger to Hell, but he doesn't think it will ever get any less awful. At least the demons looks less nightmarish than Dean had imagined they would look; they're just people with what seems to be their death wounds covered in the blood of others, instead of some weird monster hybrid.

It almost makes him have some sympathy for the Devil.

* * *

><p>When Castiel throws open the doors to the pool area, he fully expects to see Lucifer standing there in Dean's body, but there's only Lilith's bloated meatsuit floating in the water, blood staining what probably had been her best Sunday dress.<p>

Castiel wades into the water, the Colt tossed aside with a clatter to be replaced by his angel blade. Lilith is clearly AWOL or dead, her meatsuit shot full of bullets. Castiel decides he'd hate to be the one to try to explain this to the parents of this poor seven year old girl.

He's dragging her body out of the pool when Becky screams.

"Castiel! The water!"

The water's begun bubbling as if it was boiling, the air grown thick with the scent of sulfur.

Castiel sloshes towards the source of the disturbance quickly, and much to his shock, Dean rises out of the water.

Dean's eyes are solid white.

Lilith is wearing Dean's meatsuit.

Castiel grabs for Lilith, starting to hiss the words of an exorcism, but Lilith pins him underwater before he can even finish the first verse.

Becky yanks Lilith off of Castiel in one smooth, adrenaline-fueled motion, dragging the demon out of the water. Castiel grabs Lilith's feet, _Dean's feet_, and straddles the struggling monster's chest.

He hands Becky the Colt as he presses his palm to Lilith's forehead.

"Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus, omnis satanica potestas, omnis incursio infernalis adversarii, omnis legio, omnis congregatio et secta diabolica. Ergo draco maledicte et omnis legio diabolica adjuramus te. Cessa decipere humanas creaturas, eisque aeternae Perditionis venenum propinare. Vade, Satana, inventor et magister omnis fallaciae, hostis humanae salutis. Humiliare sub potenti manu dei, contremisce et effuge, invocato a nobis sancto et terribili nomine, quem inferi tremunt. Ab insidiis diaboli, libera nos, Domine…"

Suddenly, Dean's body goes slack, eyes returned to their normal hazel.

"Dean?" Castiel's voice is barely above a whisper, though it sounds like a gunshot in the now silent room.

Dean's breathing changes from steady to shallow in the blink of an eye. "Cas… Can't… Can't hold her back. Can't keep her like this forever… Didn't work…"

_Dean was actually managing to hold _Lilith_ back?_

"What?" That was the exact same exorcism Castiel has used on every demon he's ever exorcised, from grunt demons to, once quite memorably, Crowley. It should have sent Lilith right back to Hell.

Dean's eyes flicker to white. "Do you like this body, Castiel? He's all pretty and grown up…" His eyes return to normal for a moment. "Just fucking kill me, man! Get it out of me!"

Castiel presses his hands to Dean's forehead again, starts over with the exorcism. This time, Becky joins in. Her Latin isn't as smooth as Castiel's, but it's good enough.

Until, of course, Dean flicks his wrist and flings Becky into the wall with a solid crashing noise. Castiel doesn't need to examine her to know she's dead. He heard her skull crack and could feel her soul escape.

"I know you like him, Castiel, why don't you touch him? Big tough emotionless angel like you…" Dean wrenches free and grabs the Colt, his eyes flickering wildly from white to green. "Get out of me, bitch… Oh, Castiel, he's a fighter, so powerful and strong…"

There is a moment of perfect silence before Dean pulls the trigger. "I'm sorry, Cas."

The last bullet of the Colt lodges itself deep into Dean's skull. His body shudders, lit from within by the gold glow of Lilith's death.

Dean collapses in slow-motion. It's one of the loveliest, most dramatic deaths Castiel's ever seen, if he was to consider death a lovely thing. Dean's dead body falls to the floor with a dull thud, blood pooling slowly around him.

Castiel stumbles to his feet as he rolls up his sleeves.

He presses the tattoos on his forearms together once. "Into the light, I command thee…" He presses them again, though this time it's like trying to press two magnets of the same charge together. "Into the light, I command thee… Into the light, I command thee…"

The entire room trembles, shadows distorting.

"Into…the light….I command…thee!"

Uriel lands solidly in front of Castiel, his foot lodging in Castiel's throat. He's gotten a new vessel since Castiel last saw him, a large black man.

"Your ego is astounding, brother."

"Uriel. Figures." Castiel can't help but laugh. Out of all of his Heavenly brothers, it would be Uriel, the one who had known all along the truth, who happened to be in the area when Castiel desperately needed an angel's assistance. "And the wicked shall inherit the earth…"

"Are you judging me now, Castiel? After all you did and said? After you consorted with these sinful mud-monkeys?"

"Betrayal, murder, genocide… Call me provincial."

"God isn't around anymore, Castiel. You were the one who discovered that, remember? You just couldn't accept orders from your superiors, could you? We're just going to bring paradise to this world."

"By handing Earth over to Lucifer?"

Uriel picks Castiel up by his collar, dragging him to his feet. "Murderers, rapists, liars, all of them, all they have to do is ask for forgiveness, Castiel, and they are taken into eternal bliss. We're going to wipe this planet clean and make it so that it deserves what God is giving them. We'll bring endless horror, and we will make the survivors of the battle will at last be worthy of the rapture."

"Uriel… This is blasphemy."

"God is a child with an ant farm, Castiel, and no longer will we be the ants."

Uriel releases Castiel, but before the fallen angel has a chance to draw his blade, Uriel's is already out. He stabs Castiel once, right in the center of his chest, before he snaps his fingers.

Castiel is flung into the physical therapy room, slamming hard into the doors. The glass shatters under the impact, scattering around him.

He's not dead, but he's close enough. The silver strands of his remaining Grace ooze around the angel's blade still embedded in his chest, even as human blood wells up with it.

Uriel kneels beside Dean and begins the Enochian chant. Even on his deathbed, Castiel can recognize it; it's the same one he used to return Dean's soul to his body.

Castiel stares at the ceiling.

"I know You're no longer in Heaven, but if You're out there, please… Listen to me. I know I'm not the perfect soldier You created me to be. I know I'm not welcome in Heaven. But I could use a little attention… Please."

It takes all his energy to pull Uriel's blade out of his chest, but he does it.

He keeps the blade in his hand as he sits up, keeping an eye on Uriel.

The angel, of course, is too busy bringing Dean back to life to care about his once-brother's actions.

The first cut runs up his left forearm. The blade is super-sharp and glides through Castiel's skin like butter. The second cut is less study, wobbling up his right arm, going slightly further than his elbow as Castiel's control of the blade slips away.

"Lucifer, son of morning, I unleash you unto this world!" Uriel's shouting echoes through the room.

The lights flicker.

"This host has given his—"

Time freezes before Uriel has a chance to finish his sentence.

The smell of sulfur permeates the room. Castiel stares expectantly at the ceiling.

He is not disappointed.

Lucifer drifts down, dramatic as ever. At the moment, he's taken some poor man's form, all light blonde hair and stubble and blue-green eyes, dressed him in a crisp white suit.

"Hello, brother." Lucifer's tone is polite, gentle. Seductive, almost.

"Lucifer."

"Castiel, right? Well, it's splendid to meet you in person, brother."

Castiel laughs.

"Castiel, I understand from the records that you've begun travelling in an automobile. Do you mind indulging my curiosity and telling me what that was like? We can get right down to business afterwards, of course."

"Slow. Confining."

"What a peculiar thing you are. You know, Castiel, you are the one soul I'd come up here to collect myself. I've heard many interesting things about you.

"So I've heard. Do you mind?" Castiel reaches into his pocket for a cigarette.

"Oh, go right ahead."

Castiel struggles with his lighter. It flops out of his useless right arm.

"When you cut too deep, you sever the tendons. Finger movement just goes out the window. Let me help you." Lucifer flickers his fingers and the cigarette is instantly lit.

Castiel takes a drag and stares up at the Devil.

"I didn't think you'd make such a mistake as committing suicide, Castiel. But you didn't, did you?"

"How's Lilith?"

"Busy, busy, busy. Hell is a busy place, brother."

"She broke all the Seals. She's dead."

"I don't understand why you're going to try to distract me like this, Castiel. You _will_ come with me. Why resist? We have so much in common."

"Uriel is in the other room."

"I rebelled, I was cast out. You rebelled, you were cast out. I am imprisoned, yes, but I can walk in the line between life and death. I can teach you so many things, Castiel."

"He has your vessel and he's forcing it into consenting."

Lucifer laughs. "You cannot con the Devil, brother."

"Go look for yourself."

Lucifer nods as he turns towards the doors to the pool area. The doors shatter outwards as Satan approaches them.

Uriel is frozen over Dean's body, about to finish drawing the summoning sigil in his own blood.

Lucifer pulls Dean from Uriel's grip before time unfreezes. Uriel stumbles, blood splattering everywhere.

"Release him, Lucifer!"

"No, Uriel. No."

"The world will be mine, in time."

"I will smite you in His honor!"

"This is nothing more than an extension of my powers, Uriel. I'm still down in my Cage. Until Dean gives me permission, the only vessel appropriate for me is Sam here, and he's in Hell. There's no one here in reality for you to smite."

Still, Uriel reaches to punch Lucifer, but his fist freezes in front of the Devil's face.

"Looks like someone doesn't have your back anymore, Uriel."

Uriel takes a step back from Lucifer and Dean, eyes wide. He freezes before falling back into the pool. Immediately the water begins to boil.

Lucifer turns away, dropping Dean back to the floor, alive and unconscious. He pads towards the barely-living Castiel slowly.

"So, what would you like, Castiel? An extension? Your Grace restored?"

"The brother… Sam."

"What about Sam?"

"Let him go home."

"You're willing to give up your life so that a boy you've never even met can go to Heaven?"

Castiel nods.

Lucifer presses his fingertips together, considering. "Fine. It's done. Now it's time to go, brother."

Castiel extinguishes the cigarette in his own blood. He lets Lucifer grab his wrist and start to drag him off into Hell.

But before Lucifer gets further than a few yards with Castiel, the room quakes. The floor moulds around Castiel to prevent the fallen angel from being dragged into Hell.

Light fills the room. Lucifer stares into the portal that opens to Heaven as it starts to pull Castiel into it.

"No! This one belongs to me!" Lucifer hisses into Castiel's ear as he grabs him. "You belong to me, Castiel, fallen brother. And you will live. You will live a long and healthy life, and will get to prove who you truly belong to."

Lucifer reaches underneath Castiel's skin and rips out the cancer in his lungs, two blackened, smoking masses of flesh. Castiel falls to the floor immediately.

"Oh, you will live…. You will live…"

The last thing Castiel knows before he falls unconscious is that Lucifer was laughing.


	14. Swan Song

When Dean wakes up, the migraine that explodes through his head makes him think of his police academy days.

He sits up slowly, surprised to see blood pooled around him for a moment, before the memories come flooding back.

_Lilith. The Colt. Being possessed._

The tinkling of broken glass brings Dean out of his memories. Castiel kneels down beside him, smiling. His trench coat, which Dean realizes he's never seen Castiel without, is bloodstained and torn, but he looks otherwise unharmed.

"Uh, thank you. For, you know, that." Dean's not good at expressing anything past anger, frustration and smart-ass remarks, but he's obviously trying his hardest.

It makes Castiel laugh, a genuine laugh that Dean's never heard before. "No problem."

Uriel bobs to the top of the pool, coughing up water. His skin is covered in faint red markings that Castiel recognizes at once: they're the same marks that bind him to his mortal body.

"Human, Uriel? You don't deserve to be human."

The angel steps out of the pool, Castiel's blade in his hand. "You want revenge, Castiel? Is that what you're thinking right now? Do it." He hands Castiel his blade. "Do it. Kill me now. End my life! Go on, be the hand of our Father! It's your choice, it's always been your choice!"

Castiel takes back his blade and grins. "Yes." He pulls back his arm as if to stab Uriel.

But instead of a strike to the former angel's heart, he gets a punch in the face instead.

"That's called pain. Get used to it." Castiel walks out of the room, grabbing Uriel's blade from the floor where it had fallen. Dean follows him without so much as blinking at Uriel.

"You could have killed me, Castiel! You chose a higher path!"

Castiel just laughs again.

* * *

><p>Dean rubs a hand across his face as he stares at Becky's grave.<p>

Castiel gently puts the latest _Supernatural_ novel and his chunky lighter beside her gravestone and wanders over, arms limp at his sides. Dean's not quite gotten all the fine tunings of Castiel's expressions down, but he can still see the way his fists clench and his eyes glaze over.

"What the fuck are those books even about?"

"Oh, two brothers named Sam and Dean, and their adventures trying to stop the Apocalypse in their classic car."

Dean freezes. "Sam and Dean?"

"Yes. Chuck has psychic visions of alternate universes, I believe. If you're interested, Becky wrote some interesting pieces inspired by the novels."

"What the hell?"

"Of course, mostly they're just stories of the brother having kinky incestuous sex, but you're more than welcome to read them. She emailed me copies of every piece she wrote."

Dean grimaces as he stares up at the night sky. "I'll pass."

"Are you sure? If you aren't interested in incest with your younger brother, there are plenty where you and an angel named Castiel are together." Castiel watches Dean blanch, and he laughs.

Castiel stuffs a piece of gum in his mouth as he heads towards the Impala, the nicotine replacement patch making his shoulder itch where it was pressed to his skin.

"You look like a hobo in that stupid trench coat!" Dean's reduced to childish shouting, but it's all in good fun as he chases after Castiel.

"Lucifer restored my Grace, Dean, I'd be careful what I said to an angel of the Lord."

"You know what, Cas?" Dean slams the car door as he clambers into the Impala.

"What, Dean?"

"Don't ever change."

* * *

><p>Author's Note: So, that's all for now, folks. Thank you for all of your lovely comments, favourites and follows... If you want more, I have a tumblr at corpseonthestairs . tumblr. com, and I post writing and art there, too. end shameless self-promotion.


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